What is Betavoltaika?

Betavoltaics is a way to obtain common, portable electricity from the organic process of radioactive disintegration. The radioactive elements in the world always decompose and release electrons. Since electricity is only a stream of electrons traveling in the same direction, energy technology experts have long sought these elements to provide efficient, safe, long -term, environmentally friendly and small alternative to other battery systems that provide power. But certain types of elements, called radioactive isotopes, behave quite differently over time. These isotopes, such as "heavy" hydrogen or molybden-100, go through a continuous process called decaying. Nucleus "crumbling", resulting in one less neutron and one other proton, releasing one electron at a time. These electrons have a medium amount of energy, so they are called beta beta partners, unlike lower energy particles and very high -energy gamma beams (X -rays).

Betavoltaic technology uses these stray electrons as a source of electricity. A unit working from betavoltaics must contain a suitable radioactive isotope and another component called semiconductor, which helps to direct individual electrons to electricity. Although Betavoltaika has been theorized for decades, it has now gained practical popularity as a way to produce a very effective, long -lasting batteries nicknamed "nuclear" batteries.

There are several challenges that encounter reliable betavoltaics. For example, sometimes the isotope will strengthen the floating electrons, so they can no longer be free to electricity. This could be solved by the development of special semiconductors from silicon. Second, an isotope can respond to an associate in an incomprehensible way that makes it less effective. The disintegration speed can also be too slow to power anything big like a spacecraft.

It is almost equally important to explain what Betavoltaics is not, unlike what it is. Betavoltaics has nothing to do with how nuclear reactors produce electricity in giant power plants. Nuclear reactors must force massive nuclear reactions such as cleavage and fusion to produce energy from very unstable elements. Betavoltaics, however, is not a miniaturized version of the power plant that fits in the battery. It is a completely different technology and should not be confused with the dangers or secrets of other nuclear energy. There is probably no radioactive waste and certainly no threat of nuclear collapse.