[HN Gopher] Zinc Microcapacitors Are the Best of Both Worlds
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       Zinc Microcapacitors Are the Best of Both Worlds
        
       Author : Brajeshwar
       Score  : 65 points
       Date   : 2025-05-13 14:57 UTC (3 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (spectrum.ieee.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (spectrum.ieee.org)
        
       | dvh wrote:
       | What's wrong with C0G?
        
         | magicalhippo wrote:
         | Very low dielectric constant, so low capacitance for a given
         | size[1].
         | 
         | It also seema these devices are more 2D than 3D so surface area
         | matters more than volume[2].
         | 
         | [1]: https://blog.knowlescapacitors.com/blog/capacitor-
         | fundamenta...
         | 
         | [2]: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsomega.2c07549
        
         | marcosdumay wrote:
         | They are not even the same kind of component.
         | 
         | If you try to make an integrator out of this thing, you'll have
         | a very bad time.
        
       | myself248 wrote:
       | Sounds like a good match for sensor nodes where energy harvesting
       | may be slow and consumption is intermittent. You don't need
       | massive energy capacity, but you need good power density to
       | support transmit bursts, and you need very high cycle durability.
        
         | scld wrote:
         | Yeah, as long as self-discharge/leakage rates are acceptable,
         | there are a lot of use cases for this middle ground tech.
        
       | westurner wrote:
       | Why Zinc if Carbon is sufficient?
       | 
       | From "Eco-friendly artificial muscle fibers can produce and store
       | energy" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42942421 :
       | 
       | > _" Giant nanomechanical energy storage capacity in twisted
       | single-walled carbon nanotube ropes" (2024)
       | https://www.nature.com/articles/s41565-024-01645-x :_
       | 
       | >> _583 Wh /kg_
       | 
       | That's with mechanical twisting though; graphene supercapacitors
       | in general have lower energy density than (micro-) capacitors?
        
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       (page generated 2025-05-16 23:01 UTC)