A mobile phone without a battery that gets power from the air? Now, the novelty of a mobile phone without a battery has become a reality. It would be wonderful if a simple prototype may one day develop devices a bit more environmentally friendly.
Mobile Phone Without Battery?
The idea comes from the United States, where researchers at the University of Washington have developed a mobile phone that takes energy from the air. This allows it to operate without any battery, reducing not only power consumption but also electronic waste. The main headache of keeping an eye on your battery is no longer a problem.
The prototype is based on a method known as “backscatter,” allowing a device to communicate by using reflecting radio waves. This technology works by using the analog features of radio waves rather than digital ones.
Mobile Phone Without Battery using Analog BackScatter Technology
The term “backscatter” means “spread backward” or the reflection of matter, waves, radiant energy, particle board, or signals that come back to the source, in the opposite direction.
Passive Wi-Fi Technology
The research team is the same that recently created “Passive Wi-Fi,” which, unlike current communication systems using wireless, allows the transfer of large amounts of data through wireless networks with considerable energy savings—an estimated energy saving of almost 10 thousand times compared to currently available technology.
Converting human speech into digital signals consumes a lot of power. Communicating using analog technology is more efficient because it saves conversion energy loss. The backscatter method for voice calls is purely analog, and key components of the phone without batteries are housed remotely to save power.
BackScatter Analog Technology
Turning human voice into digital signals consumes a lot of energy. That’s why this technique for voice calls in this new technology is entirely analog. The base station used for transmissions operates on an unlicensed frequency intended for low-power transmissions.
To develop the phone commercially, the researchers suggest incorporating the circuit into a Wi-Fi router at home or, more likely, in a traditional phone tower. However, real cell towers are a hundred times more powerful and cover a broad area, perhaps a kilometer,” says Talla. But there is still much to do.
Small Interface
The prototype phone has a small touch screen with a little red LED that flashes briefly when a key is activated. For voice calls, you have to press a button to make a way in the air media, a style that much resembles a walkie-talkie.
In short, the phone without a battery is still a prototype. But now there are developments in which these ideas are becoming a reality, keeping us away from polluting our environment with batteries.
More Advancements in Project
However, these scientists are already thinking about the next leap in the evolution of this project, with better voice quality and an electronic ink screen for messages. They even do not rule out placing a camera. Without a doubt, this is a project to follow keenly.