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Scientists have managed to develop copper wire into a means to both transfer and store away energy by building a supercapacitor around the wire.
The revolutionary dual-purpose wire was developed by nanotechnology scientist Jayan Thomas and his Ph.D. student Zenan Yu at the University of Central Florida.
The course of action starts out by creating a sheath of nanowhiskers over the wire by heating it up.
The next step is to develop the whiskers into an electrode using a special alloy. A second plastic-covered layer of nanowhiskers formed a second electrode, which together with the first one would enable energy storage.
A special gel glued the two layers.
Because of the insulation, the inner copper wire retains its ability to channel energy, but the layers around the wire independently store powerful energy.
"We can just convert those wires into batteries so there is no need of a separate battery," Thomas said. "It has applications everywhere."
"You open your trunk and you see a lot of space is taken by your batteries. If you can just use some of the cables along the length of your car, you don't need any of that space for batteries," Thomas said.
The wire could potentially also be used in space-launch vehicles and portable electronic devices.
HN/HN