Wired Viruses: New electrodes could make better batteries
With the aid of a bacteria-infecting virus, researchers have engineered cobalt oxide-and-gold nanowires that can be used as electrodes for lithium-ion batteries. The work could lead to thin and flexible power sources, the scientists say.
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Angela M. Belcher of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and her colleagues work with a virus called M13. It’s 880 nanometers long, 6 nm wide, and coated with a few thousand identical proteins.