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Is This New 50-Year Battery for Real?


BetaVolt’s nuclear battery lasts for decades, but you won’t see one in your next iPhone—powering a mobile device would require a cell the size of a yak.

I'm sure that's what a lot of people were thinking recently, when a company called BetaVolt said it had developed a coin-sized “nuclear battery” that would last for 50 years. Instead of tapping thermal energy, it captures the ejected electrons, known as beta particles, from a radioactive isotope of nickel to form an electric circuit. It's important to know that the rate of radioactive decay isn't constant; it depends on the number of atoms of the material present, so the production of electrons declines exponentially over time.

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