新华网1月13日电 据科技博客Gizmodo文章，美国德州大学阿灵顿分校的研究人员研发了一种超微型镍合金风车，这种风车到底有多小呢？一颗米粒上足以放下十个这样的风车。假如一切按计划进行，几百个这样的小风车未来可以为智能手机供电。
这种超微型风车直径仅有1.8毫米，设计者是德州大学阿灵顿分校的Smitha Rao和J.C. Chiao。科研人员称，这种小风车由镍合金制成，非常坚固，它采用晶圆级半导体电镀原理以及一种被研发团队比作“折纸”的技术自组装完成。目前，有一家台湾公司已经在研究这种发电超微型风车商业化的可能性。
“想象一下，它们可以安装在便携式电子产品的表面，而且成本低廉，”设计者Chiao说道，“比如可以安装在手机壳上，这样当你的手机没电时，只需要给手机装上手机壳，然后在空中挥舞几分钟，手机就可以恢复正常使用了。”
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This Super-Tiny Windmill Could Someday Charge Your Phone
Researchers at the University of Texas at Arlington have come up with a way to build a nickel alloy windmill so small, 10 of them could be mounted on a grain of rice. And if all goes as planned, hundreds of the little things could end up in a case that charges up your smartphone.
UT Arlington's Smitha Rao and J.-C. Chiao designed the windmill, which at its broadest is just 1.8mm wide. Built from nickel alloy for rigidity, the little fan is self-assembled using wafer-scale semiconductor electroplating principles and a technique the team likens to origami. Rao and Chiao have partnered with WinMEMS Technologies Co., a Taiwanese company researching ways to build micro electro-mechanical systems, to bring the baby windmill to reality.
"Imagine that they can be cheaply made on the surfaces of portable electronics," Chiao said, "so you can place them on a sleeve for your smart phone. When the phone is out of battery power, all you need to do is to put on the sleeve, wave the phone in the air for a few minutes and you can use the phone again."
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