14-07-2011, 02:52 PM
For today’s electronics devices the main limiting factor is the battery there is not just enough energy for a given size and weight. As a result of the research in this field have yielded micropower generators recently. They offer higher energy storage densities. The main types are micro engine, which is the shrinked form of an internal combustion engine, thermo electric generator which generates electricity based on seeback effect, microreformers which reform hydrogen and advanced mini fuel cells which generates energy by oxidation reaction. Micropower generators are being developed based on the MEMS (microelectro mechanical systems) technology. Researchers have been developing micropower generators, tiny standalone electricity generators as possible replacement of batteries. Its predicted that by 2012 15% of the laptops will run on fuel cells. As technology of micropower generators advance the scientists predicts that we will get ‘macro-scale power from a micro-scale device’.