Dec 24, 16 / Cap 23, 00 11:17 UTC
Diamond nuclear batteries ¶
Greetings fellow Asgardians, it has recently been announced by the University of Bristol, UK that they have succeeded in developing a long life 'nuclear' diamond battery (http://www.seeker.com/nuclear-waste-and-diamonds-make-batteries-that-last-5000-years-2120412155.html) although this work is at a very early stage I thought that it would be useful to bring it to everyone's attention as technologies like this coupled with other developments such as the promising EmDrive (currently being tested by NASA) may be very useful in powering the spacecraft of the future. Essentially the next stage is to extract Carbon 14 from spend nuclear waste from the graphite used in fission reactors, crystallise this as diamond and then encase this nuclear core in a conventional diamond to provide the required radiation shielding - the result of the process is a nuclear battery that continues to provide power for over 5,000 years. I think that this an imaginative and innovative use of a nuclear 'waste' product.