TechTheDay

Wireless charging has not been adopted by the most popular tech devices on the market yet. It’s safe to say that it isn’t that popular. The technology is not viewed as something that can greatly improve the overall experience of using devices, at least for major manufacturers like Samsung and Apple. But what if these wireless chargers can do more than what their current versions are capable of doing? What if they can wirelessly charge devices that are 15 feet away?

A group at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), the same institution we mentioned in our post about a wearable thermoelectric generator, has successfully developed a wireless charger capable of recharging 40 devices simultaneously from a 15-feet distance. This means you no longer need those charging plates or pillows to re-power your devices. Putting your devices on a table or anywhere inside a room alongside this powerful wireless charger means that you can already have your batteries recharged. This charging system was introduced just recently but it was already used last month to charge some equipment at a power plant in South Korea.

The Dipole Coil Resonant System (DCRS)

Officially, this powerful wireless charging system is called the Dipole Coil Resonant System (DCRS). It is an inductive wireless charging system capable of powering devices that are up to five meters away. It makes use of magnetic fields to charge batteries from a distance. The DCRS is considered as the evolution of the technology called Couple Magnetic Resonance System (CMRS) developed in 2007 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Design

The DCRS device developed at KAIST is a nine-foot-long box that contains coils capable of creating a magnetic field that can charge the batteries used in electronic devices. The design is said to be scalable, making it efficient as it can be scaled up or down depending on the need. KAIST’s DCRS features a coil with two magnetic dipoles. One dipole is intended to induce the magnetic field and another is set up to serve as the receiver of electric power. Overall, KAIST’s DCRS is comparable to the Cota wireless charger that is set to be made commercially available next year.

Power Output

The amount of power that can be outputted by the DCRS is dependent on the distance between the primary and secondary coils.  The farther the coils are from each other, the lower output and efficiency levels become. At its peak, the prototype DCRS at KAIST can produce up to 1,403 watts of power with 36.9% efficiency. The lowest power output is 209 watts at a 9.2% efficiency. These power levels are high enough to power computer sets or a number of appliances in the living room. However, the efficiency is significantly lower than that of standard wireless charging systems. Qi wireless chargers can achieve efficiency levels of up to 70% or even higher if high quality materials are used. This means that DCRS can only be half as efficient as Qi chargers even at its peak performance.

Applications

The DCRS is envisioned to become a system that acts like Wi-Fi for batteries. With it, gadget users  may one more reason to hang out at cafes where they can charge their devices wirelessly while browsing the Internet via Wi-Fi. It has great potential for the use of typical electronic device users. It may compel top smartphone makers like Apple and Samsung to finally integrate wireless charging in their devices right out of the box.

This long-distance wireless charging system can also be used in the industrial field. Just like KAIST’s demonstration at a nuclear power plant, the DCRS can be used in settings where a number of devices can benefit from the wireless power supply as they can be positioned in certain points that may otherwise be impossible if they had to be wired or if they had to carry large batteries.

KAIST’s Dipole Coil Resonant System may seem to not have any direct significant benefit for typical electronic device users at present but it is certainly a good advancement in modern technology. It may help address the power problem in wearable or embeddable devices. There have been no thorough and comprehensive studies on the effects of the magnetic fields created by DCRS yet, but hopefully, it is safe just as what the developers of the technology claim.