Nuclear Battery

Nuclear batteries use the incredible amount of energy released naturally by tiny bits of radio active material without any fission or fusion taking place inside the battery. These devices use thin radioactive films that pack in energy at densities thousands of times greater than those of lithium-ion batteries. Because of the high energy density nuclear batteries are extremely small in size. Considering the small size and shape of the battery the scientists who developed that battery fancifully call it as"DAINTIESTDYNAMO". The word 'dainty' means pretty. Scientists have developed two types of micro nuclear batteries. One is junction type battery and the other is self-reciprocating cantilever. The operations of both are explained below one by one. JUNCTION TYPE BATTERY: The kind of nuclear batteries directly converts the high-energy particles emitted by a radioactive source into an electric current. The device consists of a small quantity of Ni-63 placed nearan ordinary silicon p-n junction - a diode, basically. WORKING: As the Ni-63 decays it emits beta particles, which are high-energy electrons that spontaneously fly out of the radioisotope's unstable nucleus. The emitted beta particles ionized the diode's atoms, exciting unpaired electrons and holes that are separated at the vicinity of the p-n interface. These separated electrons and holes streamed away form the junction, producing current.