5G starts to show its magic; a new antenna has been 3D-printed at Georgia Tech capable of harvesting energy from 5G signals to use it as a power source.
The team that built the antenna claims that soon it would transform 5G signals to a wireless power grid for sensors and internet-connected devices, offering an alternative for battery-run gadgets. Normally, antennas come with a limited field of view, but they have catered to this concern with the new antenna by leveraging it with a maximized view.
“We’ve solved the problem of only being able to look from one direction with a system that has a wide-angle of coverage,” said senior researcher Aline Eid, lead author of the paper, published in the journal Scientific Reports back in January, in a statement.
Senior Lab Advisor Jimmy Hester said, “It also doesn’t matter which way it’s pointing. With this innovation, we can have a large antenna, which works at higher frequencies and can receive power from any direction; its direction-agnostic makes it a lot more practical.”
Researchers developed the palm-sized antenna using 3D-printing in a way that it was capable of harvesting energy via millimeter waves.
The most common use of the new antenna harvesting 5G signals into power would be replacing tons of batteries of wireless sensors used in smart city and smart agricultural applications, as stated by the Georgia Tech professor.
