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Are we closing in on laptops that can recharge without those annoying power cords?

Yesterday Intel, the world's largest chip manufacturer, demonstrated a form of wireless energy transfer by lighting a 60-watt bulb from a power source three feet away, in an effect they referred to as WREL (wireless resonant energy link)

If the trick sounds familiar, that's because researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) reported the same thing last year under the moniker WiTricity.

Two years ago, MIT researcher Marin Soljacic figured out a way to transmit electricity via the magnetic field surrounding a charged loop of wire. A similar loop wired up to a light bulb or another electrical device would draw power from that magnetic field—no wires attached.

Soljacic and his colleagues reported a year later in Science they could transfer energy to a 60-watt bulb with 50 percent efficiency from six feet away and 90 percent efficiency from three feet. Intel announced they had achieved 75 percent efficiency from two to three feet away.

An Intel researcher contacted the MIT group with some technical questions after the study came out, says Andre Kurs, an MIT PhD candidate and first author on the Science paper. "From what I've seen in the pictures, they're exploring the same principles we did," Kurs told ScientificAmerican.com.

Comparing efficiencies is tricky, he said, because it depends on details such as the size of the coils used. He added that Intel's demo is the first reported replication of the MIT group's work that he's aware of.

The New York Times notes that companies such as WildCharge in Boulder, Colo., and WiPower in Altamonte Springs, Fla., have demonstrated wireless charging, but their technologies require the device to touch a charging station.

The promise of the MIT advance is having your laptop draw power from anywhere in a room, similar to WiFi. But that seems to be a ways off. You can see from the photo above that the coils involved are way too big to fit in a laptop.

Kurs said he couldn't comment on what his group has in the works next. He said the team was "taking steps" toward commercializing the technology.

Image credit: Intel

11 Comments

1. 1. Quasimodo 01:40 PM 8/22/08

   Actually, no, we can't tell anything about anything in the photo. It's much too small and you offer no option for enlarging it.

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2. 2. Wayne Spencer 03:54 PM 8/22/08

   Isn't this idae of "transmitting electricity" through the air similar to Testela's project of building a tower to transmit electricity to wide areas many years ago?
   

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3. 3. nmromero13 05:17 PM 8/22/08

   MIT and Intel did not discover this technology. Nichola Testla was the first to have the idea and develop the technology. JP Morgan squashed the idea because there wasn't an easy way to sell the electricity.

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4. 4. squidman 05:26 PM 8/22/08

   Yes it is the exact same thing except for the fact that it may be a dipole system instead of a single coil and a secondary. Nothing new at all. Tesla invented the same thing in 1891. Hardly an achievement IMHO. Tesla also had calculated how to propagate energy across the ENTIRE Earth w/o losses.

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5. 5. jschan 07:24 PM 8/22/08

   This is simply a transformer folks , one coil of wire with current flowing through it developing an electromagnetic field and inducing it in another coil , the problem is the coils need to be fairly close together and in this case pretty large , unlikely they will ever get it small enough or with enough range to be practicle. As for Tesla , Tesla's coils were huge , and consumed kilowatts of electricity , they deveveloped powerfull electromagnetic fields which you would not want to be near for any prolonged period of time.Cancer anyone?

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6. 6. mk1968 10:47 AM 8/23/08

   I think Intel missing the point.
   They could power up the CPU externally with out direct connection. There are significant losses in conduction lines that deliver power to transistors in CPU. If you could minimize conduction lines losses it will significantly lower power requirements for CPU, and increase density of transistors in it.
   

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7. 7. Mac from Groton 01:36 PM 8/23/08

   Didn't Gauss or Hertz or Marconi or someone do that in the nineteenth century? Kids if you want some real fun try the thrilling book "The Eudaemonic Pie." Its got everythilng: girls, glitz, Vegas, bras, gambling, gangsters, Steve, Stephen, fires, and Hertzian fields.

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8. 8. BioenergeticMindN 02:21 PM 8/23/08

   squidman is right. Tesla invented both transverse and longitudinal wave technologies, but preferred longitudinal because it was far more efficient and far less dangerous - especially because he wanted to give people world wide FREE wireless power. Thus, his project was scrapped and transverse wave technology became the supporting infrastructure for the centralized power paradigm. I believe Intel (or someone else) tried exactly this same concept in the article years ago, but it never got off the ground.

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9. 9. Quasimodo 04:17 PM 8/23/08

   Once Intel gets this all ironed out, is it going to ship it all over to China for manufacturing too?
   Time for the USA to stop moving manufacturing offshore. Time for Intel and its pals to bring manufacturing back to the states. US corporations are guilty of severely damaging the USA through the moving of manufacturing to offshore facilities. We've lost more than 2 MILLION jobs because of this. A lot of us here in the USA can't afford to buy or own our own houses now. We're facing an epidemic of angry citizens. Wake up, US corporations and government.

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10. 10. butbuster 06:47 PM 9/12/08

    How utterly sleazy to publish the Intel story and not mention that Tesla had this on a global scale 100 years ago. Obviously you work for corporate America.

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11. 11. j.goncerna 01:00 AM 9/18/08

    We are so late taking all the achievements from XIX to XX centuries still in the incomprehensible waiting room. The real world of progress is subjected from the wrong hands: the hands of the politicians suffering the temporary madness of being powerful more than they are... just a few years... then ignominious destiny is coming for all of us doing the extra repairing job even the price we must to pay loosing everything just to resist the madness of a few guys getting our achievements on appropiation... because "we do like being used"? Please, check pretty good who's you're going to vote for... president. I'am not US citizen but I love and appreciate too much the american strenght to work and live in a free concurrency of individuals into everything... economy, business, religion, education, etc., etc., I don't need to mention no more... please?

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