For those that may not have noticed, the above information was filed on the 14th (today). Those scientists are still struggling with the Zinc
switches for their generators, when in October these guys announced the use of an improved material: barium titanate.
www.technologyreview.com...
Now researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) have taken the first step toward building a nanogenerator out of barium
titanate. So far, efforts to make nanogenerators have focused on zinc-oxide nanowires. But barium titanate could lead to better generators because it
shows a stronger piezoelectric effect, says mechanical-science and engineering professor Min-Feng Yu, who is leading the research at UIUC. Lab
experiments show that a barium-titanate nanowire can generate 16 times as much electricity as a zinc-oxide nanowire from the same amount of mechanical
vibrations, he says.
16 times as much energy? That would yield 1280 mW in the scenario of the "electric fabric" noted above (which was only 80 mW).
The concept of piezoelectrics is just coming of age. Imagine:
1. Curtains made out of the fabric, taking the wind the ceiling fan creates and turning it back into electricity.
2. Embedding these generators onto a substrate that helps channel the electricty created into a circuit. You could literally build the house out of
them.
3. Piezoelectric inclusion on solar panels, catching the wind and noise surrounding them and turning that into energy
4. Electric motor cars that is able to turn the wind and road vibration into energy to recharge its batteries
The list could go on and on, limited only by your creativity.
The future is just around the corner, folks. And this is true, peer reviewed, performed in the lab science. it is not Area 51, and (sans any DARPA
intervention, such as what i suspect has happened to Dr. Li) it appears that it is already becoming entrenched in the public domain. Now if we cna
just keep people interested long enough to keep it from being hidden.
However, did you read the follow up link? 
