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I had no idea nuclear power had been miniaturized to this extent, wow.
Wonder how I slided into the world of Fallout? WTF!?! We have plutonium powered pacemakers? http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2015/ph241/degraw2/ Ah, okay we had . > Despite the often longer life-expectancies, nuclear pacemakers quickly became a part of the past when lithium batteries were developed. Not only did the technology improve, allowing for lighter, smaller, and programmable pacemakers, but doctors began to…
> allowing for doctors to check in on their patients and replace either the batteries or the pacemakers themselves I cynically read this as "we needed to get more money out of these patients"
[0] When the pacemaker detected a problematic arrhythmia it would give a couple of defibrillation shocks just like the paddles but right on the heart muscle. He said this felt like getting kicked in the chest by a horse and came completely out of the blue with zero warning. So it could be quite disruptive. He wanted a feature where it would tingle or beep or something just a few seconds ahead of time so he could mentally prepare; apparently the second one that was expected was a lot less traumatic. Anyway, the docs thought it was a good idea, and passed it up, but it never happened before he passed.
Just got me thinking: What would it take for us to get to a point where there are small, safe nuclear powered "batteries", that can supply enough electricity for a building.
It would take some kind of complete revolution. It’s not happening. These batteries have very poor power density and are very inefficient. The advantages of nuclear-powered batteries are: - They generate power over a long time, decades, - They generate some heat. They don’t generate much power. If you have a building, you would definitely think of a nuclear RTG as a “very shitty battery”, and that’s even if you don’t…
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> allowing for doctors to check in on their patients and replace either the batteries or the pacemakers themselves I cynically read this as "we needed to get more money out of these patients"
There’s not a single cardiac surgeon in the world who thinks he’s gonna get rich with once-every-10-years follow up appointments. We produce enough new patients to keep them all sufficiently busy.
Could I use it to power my iPhone? Frankly I’m fed up with the need for charging.
Just got me thinking: What would it take for us to get to a point where there are small, safe nuclear powered "batteries", that can supply enough electricity for a building.
RTGs have been around since the 50's and 60's: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_ge... For example Russia used them to power lighthouses in super remote parts of their coast. Space probes, mars rovers, etc. use them too.
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt1588875/
Only the Soviets were daft enough to build RTGs using Strontium 90.
Tragically relevant story to accompany this article: the Goiânia accident. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goi%C3%A2nia_accident
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If you had never been taught about radiation, you wouldn't know what to do about it either. It is not like radioactive materials are a common everyday occurrence for everyone.
What is wrong with you that you cannot see that they are also humans just like us, and were born into horrible circumstances that they never got the education to learn about this, through no fault of their own whatsoever?