this post was submitted on 16 Nov 2024
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The race to commercialise nuclear-powered batteries (www.chemistryworld.com)
submitted 15 hours ago by rssbot@lemmy.bestiver.se to c/hackernews@lemmy.bestiver.se
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[–] lnxtx@feddit.nl 2 points 14 hours ago

TIL:

In a classic classroom demonstration, alpha particles can be blocked with material as thin as a piece of paper. This means that shielding batteries based on alpha-decay is relatively easy. In the past this allowed plutonium-238 nuclear batteries to power pacemakers, until they were superseded by lithium-ion batteries.