Reading report

Name: Cristina Soledad Guzmán
Date: August 15
Title: It looks good on paper
Source: www.economist.com/index Date of publication: Aug 14th 2007

Vocabulary

Nanotubes:nano: One-billionth
Unveil:1. To remove a veil or covering from. 2. To disclose; reveal.
Plate:2. a. A sheet of hammered, rolled, or cast metal. b. A flat piece of metal on which something is engraved.
Tweak:1. To pinch or twist sharply.
Coating:coat: 3. A layer of material covering something else.4. To provide or cover with a coat or layer.
Butyl: 1. A hydrocarbon radical
Folded:fold: 1. To bend over or double up so that one part lies on another part. 2. To bring from an extended to a closed position. 3. To place together and intertwine: fold one's arms. 4. To envelop or clasp; enfold. 5. To blend in (a cooking ingredient) by slowly and gently turning one part over another. 6. Informal. To close, especially for lack of financial success; fail.
Pulse: 2. Physics. A brief sudden change in a normally constant quantity: a pulse of current.
Stack: 7. To arrange in a stack; pile. 8. Games. To prearrange the order of (a deck of cards) so as to cheat. Informal. 9. To measure up; compare.
Output: 1. An amount produced or manufactured during a certain time. 2. a. The energy, power, or work produced by a system. b. Computer Science. The information produced by a computer from a specific input.
scale up:5. To climb up or over; ascend. 6. To make in accord with a particular proportion or scale. 7. To adjust in calculated amounts: scaled down their demands.
wood-pulp:wood that has been broken into small pieces and crushed until it is soft. It is used for making paper.
Newsprint: 1. Inexpensive paper used especially for newspapers. Also called newspaper.


Main ideas

A new storage device was made by mixing carbon nanotubes with cellulose.
This is a low energy-density device which stores electricity directly by charging two conductive plates with static.
With suitable tweaking this device can be used as a capacitor, a battery or both.
Its crucial component is a solvent called 1 butyl, 3 methylimidazodium cloride able to both to dissolve cellulose and to act as an electrolyte.
This material works at temperatures from –80ºc to 180ºc and can be rolled up, folded or cut like paper.
The three-layer version, provides a unique hybrid power supply.
No poisons chemicals are used and makes it promising for medical applications.
The next phase is to convert wood-pulp to newsprint.

Personal reaction

Storing electricity is a current issue nowadays due to the possible future lack of energetic sources in the years to come, so that it is very important to find new ways of storing electricity in order to ensure the supply of this source of energy.
Apart from this fact the new material created to store electricity can work al temperatures from –80ºc to 180ºc and is flexible to manipulate so you can for instance cut it like paper with no effect on its performance what is a great valuable innovation in this field of technological investigation.
The problem with this new storage device is that it is needed a great invest of money in order to afford the scientific research and so that poor countries will always be in disadvantage to the rich ones.