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EDMONTON -- Picture charging a cellphone just once a year. Thanks to a groundbreaking new design in communications chip technology developed at the University of Alberta, that kind of technology could be just around the corner.

Researchers Dr. Vincent Gaudet, Dr. Christian Schlegel and former graduate students David Nguyen and Dr. Chris Winstead have created an analog chip which uses 100-times less energy to operate than its digital counterparts.

"It's a chip that would normally have a place in a communications receiver," Gaudet said yesterday.

It's the kind of device found, for example, in cellphones.

"It's going to significantly reduce the power consumption of the communication system."

Sending any kind of information from place to place - like an audio signal or a fax - requires some way to check if the signal was garbled or not.

Existing digital chips use mathematical formulas to add extra bits of information to the signal, which can in turn be used on the receiving end to check for errors.

But they can only make the calculations needed for error-checking by turning transistors on or off, which eats up a lot of power.

By exploiting the physics behind transistors, researchers figured out how to make the same type of calculation using tiny variations of voltage across the chip.

"It's like having a digital circuit that's completely turned of, but still exploits these very small currents when it's shut off," Gaudet said.

The technology is a fundamental change in how a chip of that type works, Schlegel said, which makes it tough to predict what impact it could have on consumer electronics.

"Our expectation is that startup companies will find a niche for it," Schlegel said.

 

Chronic Smoker

Wow thats sounds freaking astonishing, only charging my cell 1 time a year. Technology has and brings ups and downs, but this a plus for sure.

Pro

imported_Soul Rebel

That'd definately be a plus Just think of all the energy we'd be saving. Seeing as how millions of people have cell phones, and most charge them every single night.

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bongwater

sounds pretty good but I wonder when we'll hear about it next.

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Eccentrica Gallumbits (the triple-breasted whore of Eroticon Six)

and did we tell ya the name of the game boy, we call it riding the gravy train..