This article from CNN describes how researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have come up with a way to produce a new type of battery. Angela Belcher, professor of materials science and engineering at MIT, has developed a way to create batteries from an M13 bacteriophage virus. This virus is common and does not pose a health risk to humans. In the process of creating the battery, the virus becomes covered in iron phosphate and then connects to carbon nanotubes. A carbon nanotube is an extremely strong network of interconnected carbon atoms. When these virus-nanotube structures are added up in large numbers, they produce a battery. Professor Belcher has said that about ten grams of the virus-nanotube material has enough energy to power a small device for around 40 hours. One of the greater benefits of this type of battery is that no waste is created during production. Also, toxic materials that are used in normal batteries (such as lead and acid in a car battery) are not used in this type of battery.
Devin Mullen