NANO IS ON THE WAY

New tiny batteries are coming . They're not here yet, but they'll change the way a lot of everyday, important things will work.

Nano means: "Extremely small: one billionth."

I just recently heard about ''nano batteries'' as something marvelous and new, but "Popular Science Magazine" mentioned then a few years ago; the fact is, scientific people have been working on them since 2002, when a battery manufacturer produced the first AAAAA battery.

If you want to be able to talk about nano technology, intelligently (I do ), here's what I culled from various scientific sources. (I've learned that just a little knowledge goes a long way, especially if you're dealing with a lot of electronic stuff in your office and home, where I must be using more than a 1oo battreries -- different sizes, different types of batteries.)

According to technology experts, if you were to take all the laptop batteries that are produced in one year, in the "off" state, they're leaking, in the course of a year, an amount of power that could be stored in a small nuclear reactor -- power that's wasted just from laptop batteries.

MIT researchers, using tiny wires, known as carbon nanotubes, can now create "thermopower" a super powerful wave of energy. They're planning to refine it and make batteries to power electronics, computers and cell phones -- batteries that are 10 times smaller and hold more energy than what's used now.

I looked everywhere, to see if anyone had a picture of what a nano battery would look like. All I could find is what's in the picture.

What you're seeing is tiny wires, known as carbon nanotubes, with a diameter, roughly, that of a human hair. They're coated with a layer of fuel, and arranged in a mesh-like architecture — billions of tiny nano-components are interfaced together.

Researchers envision that other structures -- in a fiber-like configuration resembling a spider's web — might one day be woven into textiles

Importantly, the nano battery would mean a "green," recyclable, very tiny battery that would last a very long time without re-charging. Most batteries, nowadays, are made from highly toxic heavy metals (like nickel and cadmium), that are very bad for the environment.

Batteries made from this new thermopower technology would be completely nontoxic. So keep your eyes open, your ears ready, to hear that the batteries are available, the batteries are here, you can buy them!

It sounds great, but ... gee ... what are we going to do with all those old batteries? Will we have to replace most of our electronic stuff?