ABSTRACT
Radioisotope power sources can revolutionize microelectronics by enabling emerging microelectromechanical systems (MEMs) and nanotechnology; distributed power supplies would last years, even decades. No power cords, rectifiers, or transformers will be needed for a new generation of microdevices. Safe, direct, long-life, temperature-stable electric power will be available from an energy source providing five orders of magnitude higher power density than chemical redox systems and more than two orders of magnitude higher power density than fossil fuel oxidation reactions.
