A team of researchers from the University of Washington’s Sensor Lab have come up with a computer that doesn’t require any battery source, the WISP.
The WISP, (Wireless Identification and Sensing Platforms) is solely powered by radio waves.
No special equipment is required other than a readily-available RFID transmitter and the onboard processor.
The WISP obviously won’t be powering your consoles or desktop PC’s but it does have roughly the same power as a fitbit watch. This equates to a computer that is orders of magnitude larger than ones which previously required no external power.
It also has a unique communication feature which allows you to send data between two WISP devices, as the computer backscatters the incoming radio signals to communicate with a series of blips, a bit like Morse code.
While we could see the technology making its way into consumer-electronics, the WISP will most likely first be used outdoors, monitoring for earthquakes or for when to water your plants.
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This is just an advanced RFID tag.