Our phones, which at one point in time started to get smaller, have started to get bigger again as huge displays are always a welcome feature when watching videos and playing games. The internals however, have started to get smaller and that can only be a good thing as that could mean that our devices can start to have more features and functions packed into them such as longer lasting battery life. Thinner, longer lasting smartphones anyone?

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Researchers at the Rice University have reportedly built a battery that’s supposedly six times thinner than a bacterium. The nano battery, which is hundreds of times thinner than a human hair and more than 60,000 times smaller than a AAA battery, could potentially be used to run all sorts of minuscule electronic devices.

These nano batteries could be used to power implanted medical devices, chemical and biological sensors, along with microscopic wireless networks. They could also enable tiny embedded computers in all sorts of devices, which in turn could turn just about any consumer product into a “smart” object.

While the possibilities seem endless, the battery is unfortunately still a prototype and still faces some bugs that need to be ironed out. For starters the battery’s performance starts to diminish after recharging only 20 times, which does not seem like the most efficient solution especially if it were to be put into an implanted medical device.

Filed in . Read more about Battery and Prototype.