As the article states- the power level is too low to power anything that would register in the physical world -without much secondary amplifying power. I measured 190mV on my garden maple and the source impedance was approx 2 Kohms- hence a power source of 2 nano watts. Interesting concept though- I will check later to see if any AC LF component lurks there. This could be compared to any hum activity.
The cricket sound could well have been internal tree creaking- I have indeed listened to the flow of sap in trees that sound like water flow- which is exactly what is happening. The world of nature has many surprises if one takes the time to examine it. > Sep 17, 2:05 am, dboots <[email protected]> wrote: > Last year I caught a number of strange sounds coming from the tree in > my front yard, one of them being a fake cricket recording Trees now > generate a voltage Maybe this Univ of Washington Technology > announcement might be what was powering whatever devices were in my > tree > > I am not saying that the trees are only being used for this one > simple thing. Trees make great antennas in propagating the ELF waves > as well. > > Their is ALWAYS MORE THAN WHAT MEETS OUR EYES > AND EARS. It is so important than none of us forget that > If their is a way they definitely have a will to do it to us > > Maybe this is a method that might have relevance in other > suffers lifes > > ELECTRICAL CIRCUIT RUNS ENTIRELY OFF POWER IN TREES > > http://www.energy-daily.com/reports/Electrical_Circuit_Runs_Entirely_... > > by Staff Writers > Seattle WA (SPX) Sep 11, 2009 > > You've heard about flower power > > . What about tree power? It turns out that it's there, in small but > measurable quantities. There's enough power in trees for University of > Washington researchers to run an electronic circuit, according to > results to be published in an upcoming issue of the Institute of > Electrical and Electronics Engineers' Transactions on Nanotechnology. > "As far as we know this is the first peer-reviewed paper of someone > powering something entirely by sticking electrodes into a tree," said > co-author Babak Parviz, a UW associate professor of electrical > engineering. > A study last year from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found > that plants generate a voltage of up to 200 millivolts when one > electrode is placed in a plant and the other in the surrounding soil. > Those researchers have since started a company developing forest > sensors that exploit this new power source. The UW team sought to > further academic research in the field of tree power by building > circuits to run off that energy. They successfully ran a circuit > solely off tree power for the first time. > > Co-author Carlton Himes, a UW undergraduate student, spent last summer > exploring likely sites. Hooking nails to trees and connecting a > voltmeter, he found that bigleaf maples, common on the UW campus, > generate a steady voltage of up to a few hundred millivolts. > > The UW team next built a device that could run on the available power. > Co-author Brian Otis, a UW assistant professor of electrical > engineering, led the development of a boost converter, a device that > takes a low incoming voltage and stores it to produce a greater > output. > His team's custom boost converter works for input voltages of as > little as 20 millivolts (a millivolt is one-thousandth of a volt), an > input voltage lower than any existing such device. It produces an > output voltage of 1..1 volts, enough to run low-power sensors. > > The UW circuit is built from parts measuring 130 nanometers and it > consumes on average just 10 nanowatts of power during operation (a > nanowatt is one billionth of a watt). > "Normal electronics are not going to run on the types of voltages and > currents that we get out of a tree. But the nanoscale is not just in > size, but also in the energy and power consumption," Parviz said. > > "As new generations of technology come online," he added, "I think > it's warranted to look back at what's doable or what's not doable in > terms of a power source." > Despite using special low-power devices, the boost converter and other > electronics would spend most of their time in sleep mode in order to > conserve energy, creating a complication. > "If everything goes to sleep, the system will never wake up," Otis > said. > > To solve this problem Otis' team built a clock that runs continuously > on 1 nanowatt, about a thousandth the power required to run a > wristwatch, and when turned on operates at 350 millivolts, about a > quarter the voltage in an AA battery. The low-power clock produces an > electrical pulse once every few seconds, allowing a periodic wakeup of > the system. > > The tree-power phenomenon is different from the popular potato or > lemon experiment, in which two different metals react with the food to > create an electric potential difference that causes a current to flow. > "We specifically didn't want to confuse this effect with the potato > effect, so we used the same metal for both electrodes," Parviz said. > Tree power is unlikely to replace solar power for most applications, > Parviz admits. But the system could provide a low-cost option for > powering tree sensors that might be used to detect environmental > conditions or forest fires. The electronic output could also be used > to gauge a tree's health. > "It's not exactly established where these voltages come from. But > there seems to be some signaling in trees, similar to what happens in > the human body but with slower speed," Parviz said. "I'm interested in > applying our results as a way of investigating what the tree is doing. > > When you go to the doctor, the first thing that they measure is your > pulse. We don't really have something similar for trees." > Other co-authors are Eric Carlson and Ryan Ricchiuti of the UW. The > research was funded in part by the National Science Foundation --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Hum Sufferers" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/hum-sufferers?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
