Scientist proposes quantum laptop batteries

Boffins in Illinois believe they have figured out how to design a laptop batteries with ten times the energy density of the best of today's lithium-ion batteries. The design is called a "digital quantum battery" and it comes from University of Illinois Director of the Center for Complex Systems Research Alfred Hubler, who has written up his thoughts in a piece penned for the journal Complexity. According to Hubler, quantum effects, present because of nanometre scale of the capacitor, prevent the charge on one electrode jumping to the other when the electric field between the electrodes reaches a critical point.