Microchip being built makes phone batteries last one month without charging
Topics: Technology, Phones
Callum Jones
Featured Image Credit: Lorenzo Di Cola/NurPhoto via Getty Images / MintNeuro
Topics: Technology, Phones
It's an unfortunate inconvenience a lot of us have to deal with every single day... the dreaded battery on our phone running out of juice.
Depending on what phone you have, this can even happen multiple times a day - and quite frankly, it's really annoying isn't it?
Well, what if I told you there is something in the works that could make smartphones last an entire month before they need a charge.
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Unheard of really isn't it?
But that may soon become a reality, thanks to scientists at Cambridge University.
That is because they are working on a microchip that could effectively mean that the devices in our pocket only need to be charged 12 times a year.
Vaire, the commercial arm at the prestigious university, is being backed by the UK government as one of over a dozen semiconductor startups to hopefully put the UK at the forefront of the tech industry.
Semiconductors have been described by Ministry of Tech, Paul Scully, as the 'bedrock' of the modern world by a minister, something that is vital in today's modern world, according to a government press release.
But as for the microchip being developed at Cambridge, that is being developed by a team of rather talented mathematics researchers.
Essentially, the idea is based on designing a silicon chip processor that needs nearly zero energy to run.
This will mean there is less need for a better battery - which should mean better battery lives for our smartphones.
Unfortunately, there is not a lot more information surrounding this new microchip in the public domain, though it remains an existing prospect to a lot of us.
Sean Redmond, chief executive of SiliconCatalyst.UK, the company running the project, said: "If they can really deliver on that outrageous claim, it means that you will have a mobile phone that will last a month, not a day.
"Nobody in the world today has been able to realise that in a semiconductor chip - if anybody can do it, this team out of Cambridge in the UK will be able to."
The chip is said to be over 100 times smaller than current state-of-the-art devices, though it isn't exactly all new.
Similar devices have been used in the medical profession for years now, for example, in cochlear implants for deaf people.
These chips are part of a $1.5 million ( £1.3 million) programme designed to 'revolutionise the lives of people not only in the UK, but across the world', which also includes a chip that helps with debilitating brain conditions like Parkinson's.
But the technology hasn't developed much in recent years, so researchers in the coming years and months will hope to make some progress.