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Magnetism and spin

Magnetism and spin

Wireless power a reality

07 Jun 2007

The mess of electrical cables that recharge our laptops, mobile phones and PDAs could soon disappear altogether -- at least according to a team of US physicists, who have shown how power can be transmitted without wires using special "resonant" antennas. The researchers used the system to power a 60-W light bulb placed two metres from a wireless transmitter, and say that it could be scaled down for use in portable devices without a loss of efficiency (Science Express doi: 10.1126/science.1143254).

A power of good
Power without wires isn’t a new concept – in the early 1900s before electricity grids we

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