They are making a rechargeable battery made only from food

Not only is food part of our diet, but now it has also become a kind of fully rechargeable battery. That’s how it proves a job It was done by a group of researchers from the Italian Institute of Technology.

As they explained in their study recently publishedYou can get a new type of battery made entirely from food or completely edible materials. A prototype device operated at 0.65 volts (fairly innocuous) and delivered a current of 48 microamps for 12 minutes, well within the range needed to power small electronic devices.

As explained by lead author Mario Caironi, a molecular electronics researcher at the Italian Institute of Technology:

Potential future uses range from edible circuits and sensors that can monitor sanitary conditions to powering sensors to monitor food storage conditions. Moreover, due to the level of safety of these batteries, they can be used in children’s toys, where there is a high risk of ingestion.

The team behind this development says the battery maintains its charge for dozens of cycles, though it needs to be outside the body to recharge. The prototype created here is about a square centimeter in size, although they are already working on making it smaller. According to Caironi:

In fact, we are already developing devices with higher capacity and reducing the overall size. These advances will be tested in the future to power edible soft robots as well.

And What can it be used for? As they explain, devices like “dwarf” cameras are capable of scanning and detecting diseases, and this is exactly where the researchers think the “edible” battery can help.

Not just that. They also speak to the field of food quality control: The devices could be used to check that food is safe and meets required standards while it’s already in the gut, before the controller digests it with the food.

It sounds very futuristic, of course, but that’s the idea they’re working on, “and we think they’ll inspire other scientists to build safer batteries for a truly sustainable future,” they say.