Read more.No moving parts, no emissions, no maintenance, and very safe, batteries.
Read more.No moving parts, no emissions, no maintenance, and very safe, batteries.
Baby steps but this could be a great discovery, who knows where it might lead even just 20 years from now.
I tried to resist watching the video, suspicious that it lacked even a bit of technical information to satiate my desire to learn more.
My mind was weak and my suspicion wasn't unwarranted.
The video is rubbish, it's your average feel-good animated slide show backed with a cliched glockenspiel and ukulele track. Don't make the same mistake and save yourself the time, don't watch it.
Many unanswered questions, many meaningless statements.
Last edited by DDY; 28-11-2016 at 05:52 PM.
badass (29-11-2016)
Ah I can see the diamond encrusted apple watch.....
I'm just worried about the banana.
If we had some idea of the size and voltage/current output of these batteries we'd have an easier time figuring out what could be powered by them.
A battery the size of a 'D' cell with the power output that can barely power a digital watch would be near useless.
A battery the size of a cr2032 with a power output of a 'aaa' cell would be much more useful however.
I want to know how they generate electricity from the nuclear reaction. As a guess, perhaps the carbon is used as a semiconductor and the diamond is doped to make it perform in the same way as a solar cell, but instead of the sun as a power source it takes energy from the nuclear decay. So you would get similar efficiency as a solar cell, but you won't be getting the sort of energy per square meter you get from the sun (during day at least, would be much better at night ).
That would make sense to grow your diamond "cell" as a flat plane, but unlike a solar cell because the energy source is internal you could stack them quite easily. So I presume we are talking the sort of power output of a fairly rubbish solar cell, but could be layered into a cube to make it less delicate.
Wonder if I am even vaguely close
"In a perfect world... spammers would get caught, go to jail, and share a cell with many men who have enlarged their penises, taken Viagra and are looking for a new relationship."
Such bad science reporting. And it's the university putting out this junk:
Hardness of material has nothing to do with radiation safety. Density#is the main thing that blocks radioactive particles. For example lead is great for blocking some radiation due to high density, but bad for C14 because that emits beta radiation (energetic electrons) and when those slow down suddenly then they emit x-rays.Dr Fox added that "In fact, diamond is the hardest substance known to man, there is literally nothing we could use that could offer more protection."
And I can't believe the synthetic diamond is an economically viable way to contain radioactive waste compared to just burying it.
The banana is likely a weak reference to https://xkcd.com/radiation/
LOOOOL Bull crap. Hardness <> safety. Impact shattering, fracture planes, chemical attack, etc. All ways to exploit/mar a diamond. I'd rather have it in a weaker ductile material that will deform under impact. Like the way we store nuclear waste now before transporting it on trains."In fact, diamond is the hardest substance known to man, there is literally nothing we could use that could offer more protection."
So, blutac.
Probably worth balancing my previous post by noting that they do encase nuclear waste in sintered/vitirified glass/ceramic at Sellafield reprocessing plant before putting it in steel containers and filling them with concrete and burying them deep underground. The different layers do different things. The glass/ceramic is to bind the harmful elements so they can't escape and become airborne dust. The concrete and steel containers do the physical protecting. I imagine there are also some lead shields and the like for radiation absorption while it's transported. But SFAIK it would be wrong to suggest that they could simply do the ceramic alone and "job done".
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