Clinical laboratory IT solutions could create power from heat

Clinical laboratory IT solutions might be expected to consume power and create heat, the waste product that must be exhausted from electronic systems to keep them within a safe operating temperature range.

However, at least part of that process may be able to be reversed using modern compound semiconductor materials.

Scientists at Ohio State University have been looking into the use of gallium manganese arsenide to induce quantum spin when exposed to heat.

They argue that systems running on heat, rather than on electricity, could allow the thermal energy exhausted from clinical laboratory IT solutions to be retrieved and power a second level of computing equipment.

Dr Roberto Myers, assistant professor of materials science and electrical engineering, says: "All of the computers we have now could actually run much faster than they do, but they're not allowed to because, if they did, they would fail after a short time."

His research interests include quantum wells and quantum dots, along with epitaxial growth in wide-bandgap semiconductors.