A world without wires
- Dr Katie Hall is developing was to transfer power without wires
- In the home of the future, wireless energy will be as common as Wi-Fi internet, she believes
- The technology could lead to new and revolutionary medical devices
(CNN) -- Katie Hall was shocked the second she saw it: a light-bulb glowing in middle of a room with no wires attached.
Looking back, it was a crude experiment, she remembers: a tiny room filled with gigantic cooper refrigerator coils -- the kind you'd see if you cracked open the back of your freezer.
She walked in and out between the coils and the bulb -- and still the bulb glowed.
"I said: 'Let's work on this. This is the future.'"
What's the trick?
"We're going to transfer power without any kind of wires," says Dr Hall, now Chief Technology Officer at WiTricity -- a start-up developing wireless "resonance" technology.
"But, we're not actually putting electricity in the air. What we're doing is putting a magnetic field in the air."
It works like this: WiTricity build a "Source Resonator" -- a coil of electrical wire that generates a magnetic field when power is attached.
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Is this the ultimate space suit for Mars?If another coil is brought close, an electrical charge can be generated in it. No wires required.
"When you bring a device into that magnetic field, it induces a current in the device, and by that you're able to transfer power," explains Dr Hall.
And like that, the bulb lights up.
Wireless homes
Don't worry about getting zapped: Hall assures that the magnetic fields used to transfer energy are "perfectly safe" -- in fact, they are the same kind of fields used in Wi-Fi routers.
In the house of the future, wire-free energy transfer could be as easy as wireless internet.
More at: http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/14/tech/innovation/wireless-electricity/index.html
Replies
Yeah the WiTricity might change the world with respect to the wired electric technology and make it look like a some form of a new age sophisticated technology; of course it's going to be good for science and the researchers to study the phenomena etc involved. When asked Dr. Hall about the harmful effects she said its not harmful to us. I don't know why she said that. Strong magnetic fields do have harmful effects on our bodies. According to the article a Resonator Source is going to produce a magnetic field for the whole house, so that the devices can function anywhere in the house. Magnetic Field spanning the entire house? Now that's some powerful magnetic field I guess. Hopefully it don't effect us in a bad way.
I think they don't care about people, all they want is to run a successful business and make money.
Wireless Electricity is not something new. 100 odd years ago Nikola Tesla discovered Wireless Electricity. He designed the Tesla Coils which are the "Sources" of Wireless Electricity. Many universities across the world replicate his designs and study them. And wireless Electricity if used correctly could prove to be useful for our bodies too because it induces healing effects. Tesla also had invented a few healing technologies based on his wireless electricity concept.
"She walked in and out between the coils and the bulb -- and still the bulb glowed."
And so did the iron in her blood. ;)
"He designed the Tesla Coils which are the "Sources" of Wireless Electricity"
But in the world of microchips a Tesla coil is only usable as a directed EMP-weapon though. That's probably why that particular tech isn't used nowadays. It's incompatible with microelectronics. It kills it. ;)
The voltages and currents on which our household appliances work contains electronics in them which are not compatible with the input voltages and currents on which those appliances work. But still the electronics function perfectly fine in them.
If they were to use tesla coils in today's world real life applications, some other technology would've been made to be compatible with the tesla coil's voltages/currents. Tesla actually said that it was possible to transmit information(pics, voice etc. a kind of wireless internet so to speak) to any part of the globe using his technology.
This is not new
every transformer on earth works with the same principles
Yep, the only difference is the 'resonator' coil which basically fixes the frequency to a set value instead of it fluctuating between say 50 - 60 Hz.
Everything in existence has it's own resonant frequency ie: An opera singer hits the same resonant frequency of a wine glass, that glass will vibrate in sympathy to the frequency until it breaks. If an electromagnetic frequency is set to the resonant frequency of the coil inside the globe then this coil will glow in sympathy to the resonant EM wave.
I were sensible enough to choose to live far from any power lines that had magnetic fields large enough to reach me due to the negative effects we seem to experience when exposed to electromagnetic energy, and now they want me to buy a "radiation-unit" to put in my home? *facepalm* ;)
I have enough trouble with the electromagnetic fields around my cables as it is. I don't want it in the air as well. ;)
@ Acute Oberver. Electromagnetic waves travel through the air. They're not only around your cables but also they're all around passing through you. Apart from that, the Earth also has its own magnetic field. So there's quite a lot happening around us.
"Electromagnetic waves travel through the air. They're not only around your cables but also they're all around passing through you."
Of course, but this exposure can be minimized by the way you place the cables as well as by how you shield them.
"Apart from that, the Earth also has its own magnetic field. So there's quite a lot happening around us."
So what are you trying to say, that it's harmless to live under a european interregional power-line? ;)
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