Wireless Charging

When a pacemaker's battery gets low, the whole implant typically has to be surgically replaced. Scientists are therefore developing a noninvasive battery recharging system, which utilizes externally applied ultrasound.

Ordinarily, wireless chargers emit an electromagnetic field in just one direction, limiting the number of devices they can charge at once. A new charger, however, produces a donut-shaped field, for the simultaneous charging of multiple gadgets.

Wireless charging systems for electric cars certainly are convenient, as drivers just park the vehicle, get out, and leave it to charge. Well, Dutch company Tiler has created a similar technology for ebikes.

Wireless power transmission has potential, but range is a major hurdle. In a new proof-of-concept, Ericsson and PowerLight Technologies demonstrated a technique called optical beaming, using a laser to transmit power to a portable 5G base station.

Widespread wireless charging could one day keep our devices juiced up indefinitely. A new breakthrough has been made in that direction, as researchers in Japan have developed a system that can turn a whole room into a wireless charger.

Premium audio brand Klipsch is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year, and is marking the occasion with the launch of a pair of ANC true wireless earphones that tap into Bragi AI to control functionality using head gestures such as nodding.

Chinese smartphone manufacturer Xiaomi has demonstrated a new Hypercharge system that can charge phones at a monstrous 200 W through a wire, and 120 W wirelessly. Just three minutes on the charge cable is enough to get a large phone battery to 50 percent.

A team from Georgia Tech has just announced a world-first: a 3D-printed rectifying antenna the size of a playing card that can harvest electromagnetic energy from 5G signals and use it to power devices, turning 5G networks into wireless power grids.

Chinese smartphone giant Xiaomi has introduced new Mi Air Charge technology that it says can power up your smartphone from across the room – as soon as you walk into a room with the system installed, your handset battery level starts rising.

Around this time last year, Marshall released a new version of its Major wireless headphones that offered a ludicrous 60 hours of per charge use time. Now the brand has thrown another 20 hours into the mix with the release of the Major IV on-ears.

With any electric vehicle, you're going to spend some time parked up and plugged in. Being able to roll along the highway with the batteries charging as go would be much better, and a new development out of Stanford could see that happening.

Back in 2016, ORNL developed a 20-kW wireless charger for electric vehicles with a reported 90 percent efficiency. That was for passenger vehicles, and now a system for a medium duty, plug-in hybrid delivery truck has been successfully tested.