
Everyone’s worried about energy, right? Whether it’s the thought of a peak-oil catastrophe (while a zillion gallons fester in the Gulf), or just an ecological desire to go green, we’ve become a country that frets about our future power sources. And what about pacemakers, or artificial kidneys? We can’t very well expect those to go solar, but it turns out that a sugary diet might be able to fuel the medical devices that keep you going.
Researchers at Joseph Fourier University in Grenoble, France have successfully implanted the first glucose-based biofuel cell (GBFC) in an animal. Current devices operate on batteries, which must be surgically removed when they run out of juice. Not so with these GBFCs, which are about the size of a couple of pennies stuck back-to-back (much smaller than current batteries). The graphite-based cell is wrapped in a clear dialysis bag, and contains on each side different enzymes that digest oxygen from air and sugar from food, respectively. As the enzymes break down those molecules, they create an electrical charge.
Continue reading Biofuel Cells Power Pacemakers With Sugar and Air
Filed under: Green Tech, Visionaries
Biofuel Cells Power Pacemakers With Sugar and Air originally appeared on Switched on Wed, 26 May 2010 12:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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