Brisk walking

Soon, instead of having to walk to the nearest store for new batteries, it will be enough for a walk. For example, in the park - and recharged sneakers will do the job.
Another device for converting mechanical energy into electricity offered to employed engineers in the U.S., led by Tom Krupenkinym (Tom Krupenkin).Completely replace conventional chargers, it is unlikely to, but can greatly increase the interval between charges cell phones, smartphones, and in general all your favorite gadgets.
Researchers have shown that in the process step in the form of heat is dissipated as much as 20 watts of power (each leg), and developers are constantly looking for ways of effective recovery and utilization. However, until now the efficiency was low: could generate a few microwatts to hundreds of milliwatts, which is obviously not enough for the usual portable electronics.
One approach to this problem is to use a conventional electrostatic capacitor , a device for storing charge, consisting of a pair of thin, flat electrodes (plates) arranged parallel to each other and separated by a dielectric layer. One electrode accumulates positive charges, the other - negative and the number of charges which can accumulate a capacitor (capacitance) depends on the properties of the plates, and on the properties and thickness of the insulating layer between them. If the condenser is to squeeze, reducing the distance between the plates, the capacitance and voltage are growing - and in the circuit associated with the capacitor plates there is a current, which can be used. When removing the external pressure, the system returns to its original state.
The key to this approach is that the smaller the distance between the capacitor plates and more than its capacity, the greater the increase in tension - and the higher is the efficiency of this generator. However, due to the natural roughness of the electrode surface, especially under constant pressure from deforming, to achieve the minimum distance for efficient collection of energy is not too simple: it is usually the order of micrometers, which is totally inadequate.
So Tom Krupenkin and his team decided to simply abandon one of the solid electrode and replace it with a conductive liquid. For a start they have a flat conductor and struck him such a tiny droplets of fluid, and the top placed second thin wire covered with insulating layer thickness of 10-50 nm - that this quantity is limited as a result of the distance between the capacitor plates. If the top plate to pin down, created quite a decent voltage: according to calculations the authors for a capacitor with an average area of ​​the leg in this way you can collect up to 2 watts of power - several orders of magnitude greater than that of the authors of other systems. This means that to fully charge a standard mobile phone need dvuchasovaya walk.
Krupenkin with colleagues so inspired by this success that has already formed a company InStep NanoPower to commercialize its technology. Currently they are working to create a working prototype of the generator, which could be put in the sole of shoes - and they promise to show him a couple of years.