[HN Gopher] Nuclear-Powered Cardiac Pacemakers ___________________________________________________________________ Nuclear-Powered Cardiac Pacemakers Author : bookofjoe Score : 346 points Date : 2022-09-02 13:22 UTC (9 hours ago) (HTM) web link (osrp.lanl.gov) (TXT) w3m dump (osrp.lanl.gov) | bhaak wrote: | Wonder how I slided into the world of Fallout? | | WTF!?! We have plutonium powered pacemakers? | | http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2015/ph241/degraw2/ | | Ah, okay we _had_. | | > Despite the often longer life-expectancies, nuclear pacemakers | quickly became a part of the past when lithium batteries were | developed. Not only did the technology improve, allowing for | lighter, smaller, and programmable pacemakers, but doctors began | to realize that this excessive longevity of nuclear pacemakers | was excessive. Lithium pacemakers often last 10-15 years allowing | for doctors to check in on their patients and replace either the | batteries or the pacemakers themselves with new and improved | technology as it is develops in those 10-15 year spans. | mysterydip wrote: | > allowing for doctors to check in on their patients and | replace either the batteries or the pacemakers themselves | | I cynically read this as "we needed to get more money out of | these patients" | hwillis wrote: | You really should not. 60 beats per minute means that in ten | years the leads of a pacemaker will be bent *315 million* | times. That's an order of magnitude higher than we typically | test fatigue resistance, and even if we were that confident | about being able to produce flawless materials, there are | _millions_ of different enzymes and acids and temperature | fluctuations in the body. Any one of those could impact the | fatigue resistance. | | Additionally, any kind of implanted device is _significantly_ | prone to a wide range of problems that range from | inconvenient to devastating. The human body is very hostile | to foreign objects, often with few warning signs. Clots and | fibrous capsules (and eventually, calcified capsules) form | around ANY implant, and that 's the _best_ case problem. | | Titanium is extremely biocompatible. It forms a thinner | capsule than most materials. It integrates with bones | beautifully, due to surface treatments that allow bone to | grow into microscopic surface cavities, with strong molecular | bonds. But also sometimes, for no apparent reason, all the | bone around a titanium implant will just start dying and | resorbing. It's rare, but if you get a hip replacement you | absolutely need to check on it regularly because if you don't | you'll lose use of the leg completely (and quickly, and | permanently). | | In and around the heart is one of the most challenging places | to implant things, aside from maybe the brain. Any moving | part of the body will constantly stress any mechanical part, | and build up scar tissue around and rubbing spots. The only | reason the brain is worse is because its fragile and changes | size significantly when you sleep. | | Recently we started using _leadless_ pacemakers. Even before | that pacemakers were continually getting smaller, and smaller | pacemakers are less irritating and experience less stress and | movement. Even if that weren 't true, it would _still_ be | worth checking in on pacemakers, because they 're doing | incredibly hard jobs and if they fail people can die faster | than they can get to a hospital. | | EDIT: oh, and heart disease is the #1 cause of death in the | US, while heart surgery is one of the most difficult | specialties to get in to. They are absolutely never short on | patients, lol. | nousermane wrote: | > _315 million_ times. That 's an order of magnitude higher | than we typically test fatigue resistance | | Nah, it's not that bad. Decent mechanical keyboard switch | is specified for 100 million clicks [1, or google for | "switch million actuations"]. Surely good engineering can | eek out another order of magnitude. Not to mention - | pacemaker leads ("wires"), the only part that bends, have | _way_ less stress on them (= larger bend radius) compared | to a keyboard switch. Oh, and technology of multi-strand | wire for redundancy is a very well established and | understood one. | | [1] https://cdn-shop.adafruit.com/product- | files/4974/EN_CHERRY_M... | pixl97 wrote: | You're not counting failure rate over time. How many | people actually click a key 100M clicks? What does the | bathtub curve look like? What's the failure rates at | 1,10,100,200M clicks? | | I'm going to assume those failure numbers are far higher | than you'd want for something keeping you alive. | [deleted] | cududa wrote: | The absolutely arrogance to assume a keyboard switch and | a pace maker are anywhere near the same thing... | tom_ wrote: | Indeed, the keyboard switch people have to produce a | device that's manufacturable at scale for pennies per | unit, and can be fitted in unforgiving environments by | the untrained. | macintux wrote: | They also make a product that, when it fails, doesn't | generally kill anyone. | melq wrote: | How is that comparable to a pacemaker in any way? They | aren't made for a similar scale, price, or 'environment', | and would only be installed/serviced/dealt with at all by | anyone aside from highly trained specialists. | monetus wrote: | Intentions aside, I read it as a very narrow comparison | of the relative durability - I'm guessing they weren't | trying to devalue pacemaker engineering. | [deleted] | ceeplusplus wrote: | I've had Cherry switches fail right as the keyboard's | warranty was up. The switch feels soft after wearing out, | it gets dust in it and starts double typing, etc. | Pacemakers need to be 100% reliable, not 99.9%. | formerly_proven wrote: | Seen way too many failed Cherry MX (OG, vintage and | third-party) switches to believe that. | R0b0t1 wrote: | > EDIT: oh, and heart disease is the #1 cause of death in | the US, while heart surgery is one of the most difficult | specialties to get in to. They are absolutely never short | on patients, lol. | | This is still relevant to his concern, but from the other | end. They might be making the labor artificially scarce to | increase pay. | ampdepolymerase wrote: | > _This is still relevant to his concern, but from the | other end. They might be making the labor artificially | scarce to increase pay._ | | This is very much true. I find that a lot of people in | tech seem to put healthcare on a pedestal and believe | that the professionalisation and gatekeeping of the | industry create a better outcome than other engineering | fields. This is very much untrue, the healthcare field is | in need of massive disruption and lobbying to increase | labor supply. You are being downvoted because a lot of | tech people here hate to imagine that healthcare at the | highest level is still subject to market forces like | everything else. Medical training is being severely | gatekept and hindered via the current | apprenticeship/residency system. After all, we call the | worst medical student, doctor. If you want to improve | healthcare, tie medical school admission to the MCAT | score, and _only_ the MCAT score. You are not going to | get better doctors just because candidates spend their | summers building houses in some impoverished third world | country. | zaroth wrote: | I live near Boston which is known for its medical | centers, so this might skew things somewhat, but it seems | like every graduate I know is going into medicine of some | form (surgery, anesthesia, nursing, surgical tech, | hospice, etc. etc.) | | I heard consistently that residency slots are extremely | competitive and a lot of qualified candidates get passed | over. The more I learn about the process the more insane | it seems. | | From the student perspective you go from paying to work | one day and spending most your time working cases with | zero relevance to your actual specialty, to raking in | several hundred thousand a year. | | It also seems like hospital systems seem to spend more | than half their capacity either dealing with patients | that don't need to be there but there's literally no | place to send them, or patients that are too far gone and | untreatable but there's literally no place to send them. | | Healthcare is like a Gordian knot of terrible policies | cemented into place by trillions of dollars of government | spending. | Am4TIfIsER0ppos wrote: | More like deliberately increasing demand for the service. | zaroth wrote: | Are you positing a conspiracy between McDonalds and | Cardiothoracic Surgeons? | NikolaNovak wrote: | >>"changes size significantly when you sleep." | | Wait,what?? | fennecfoxen wrote: | Brain neurons going into sleep mode eject some of the | cell contents and shrink, which apparently also helps | flush waste because the cerebrospinal fluid can flow | better. | rudididdjdh wrote: | furyofantares wrote: | It's a weird argument, though, that we should be checking | in on the state of the patient & these devices, but we | don't do it unless we have the additional problem of | needing to replace a battery. | sgtnoodle wrote: | Modern devices provide a wealth of telemetry completely | autonomously. My pacemaker talks at least daily to a UFO | shaped brick on my night stand via BLE. The brick has an | integrated cell modem, and was given to me pre- | configured. It has a bright green light (that turns off | in the dark) to show that it's functional. It has a | single button I have never pressed, for if I think | something notable enough happened that my doctor's office | needs to be sent a report sooner than every 90 days or | so. | ethbr0 wrote: | I'd think cert expiration would have taught all of us | that out of sight and working is out of a busy, | multitasking mind. | sgtnoodle wrote: | It sounds like you have quite a bit of knowledge on the | subject. I had to get a pacemaker a couple years ago, and | am an embedded engineer. I hope to live another 50 years at | least, so this is an interesting subject for me. | | Maybe my cardiologist is just trying to make me feel good, | but he says my leads will likely last 30-50 years. | Intuitively that seems unlikely, but we'll see. It's got to | be one of the most engineered cables in existence. | | The leadless pacemakers are indeed a technical marvel, but | they aren't yet nearly as feature packed as shoulder | implanted devices. They'll keep your heart from stopping if | your nerves are flaky from time to time, but they don't | have the energy storage to do much more than that. Mine | monitors every single beat my heart takes, and | automatically reports issues to my doctor via BLE. (Is | bluetooth more or less scary than radioactive isotopes | mounted in your body?) | | For about 8 months, my AV nerves were completely broken, | and the pacemaker paced my ventricles 100% of the time. It | was a nearly perfect drop-in replacement for the failed | nerves. A leadless pacemaker wouldn't have had nearly the | same performance. My nerves eventually started mostly | working again, and now I'm on track to have a battery life | pushing 15 years. | | It would of course be great for the technology to advance | even more over the next decade. Since my nerves mostly | healed, a leadless device with a 30+ year battery life | would be a nice replacement. With a shorter battery life, I | don't really want to be collecting them in my heart (they | don't plan to remove leadless pacemakers when they die.) | I'm hoping by the time my current device is worn out, it | will have logged enough telemetry for me to convince my | cardiologist that I don't need a pacemaker at all, though. | guhidalg wrote: | My heart sank when you mentioned a BLE-enabled pacemaker. | Has technology gone too far? /s | melq wrote: | It sounds like the bluetooth functionality is only there | for telemetry. | samstave wrote: | An interesting thought would be to have a nano-lead down | the arterials to the wrist, where an external telemetry | relay-watch could read the signals, and have the BLE | device top dermal. (apple watch) | | eliminating RF/BLE bullshit from talking to the | pacemaker. | sgtnoodle wrote: | Being pragmatic, that sounds way worse than just having a | little ceramic 2.4ghz antenna and some extra silicon | potted into the device! | samstave wrote: | https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2379009/Barnaby- | Jac... | | - | | Oops - I didnt realize you were same poster from other | comment | sgtnoodle wrote: | I don't think my particular pacemaker has the necessary | circuitry to generate more than 5V, in pulses less than a | few milliseconds. The voltage doesn't really matter much | to the muscle. | | If you got in you could probably put the leads into | single-ended mode (so that there's more current path to | cause mayhem) and pace my atrium and ventricles at | 210bpm, and effectively give me a seizure. I can't | imagine it would kill me before an EMS arrived with a | magnet? | | Perhaps a more nuanced attack would be to somehow use all | the configuration parameters to intentionally bias the | pulses so that there's net charge going into the muscle. | Over a long time that would cause tissue damage. | | If someone wanted to kill me overtly, a gun would be less | work. A pacemaker malfunction that bad would be | thoroughly investigated, and would be fixed in new | devices within a year or two. | RavZterz wrote: | If they were able to cause the pacemaker to fire when | they wanted they could time it during the repolarization, | which could possibly cause a fatal arrhythmia even in a | heart that doesn't need a pacemaker. It's called R-on-T | phenomenon and it's usually caused by malfunctioning | pacemakers. | samstave wrote: | The crazy thing was that this was when there was a lot of | talk about Dick Cheney and how he was vuln to this attack | -- and there was a lot of spec around if barnaby was | silenced because it was the older, Cheney-esque | politicians that could be taken out by this vector... | | Perhaps, he got the 'reverse bounty' on this bug... | sgtnoodle wrote: | It's not. It's a full diagnostic interface. Someone with | the right software and my serial number could reconfigure | it from across the room. | | BLE replaces the previous diagnostic interface, which was | some form of near-field. You had to have a puck resting | within a few inches, going to a several decade old | toughbook. My device supports both. It's just in the last | couple years that UCLA got the BLE equipment, and | sometimes a doctor will whip out the old gear if they | feel more confident with it. | | When I had the pacemaker first implanted, there was a | reliability problem they had to do a second operation to | fix it. The pacemaker failed to "capture" my ventricle a | few times when it should have. It turned out to be a | loose lead connection, but the device's impedance | diagnostics didn't make the issue immediately obvious. My | overall case was weird enough that UCLA did a case study | about it, so for the revision procedure they had a vendor | rep in the room to help out just in case. She was holding | a tablet and pushing buttons that would make my heart | temporarily stop. | | Now my AV nerves mostly work again, so the pacemaker | can't stop my heart if it wanted to. It can only increase | my heart rate, and report unusual patterns to my doctor. | Also, if someone did somehow mess with it, holding a | strong magnet near it will force it into safe mode. | spicybright wrote: | That's fascinating, and very unfortunate how lax the | security likely is for an organ keeping you alive. | | You would think if you can detect a strong magnet, you | could use that to turn the wireless on and off... Like | how holding a power button on a phone turns it off, but | holding longer can do a factory reset or what have you. | | Glad you're doing better since then, though. | samstave wrote: | >> _I had to get a pacemaker a couple years ago, and am | an __embedded engineer__._ | | <3 -- This sounds like a badge of courage-type | Classification. I love this sentence. | | - | | Recall BARNABY JACK? (the guy who claimed he could build | a pacemaker killer and was to present at DEFCON and then | "suicided" over drugs (yes, I know he had a drug problem | - but he was lit going to give a talk at defcon about | this subject) | | I am so fucking tired of people who downvote on HN | because they dont know their fucking internet history: | | https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2379009/Barnaby- | Jac... | | You shouldnt be able to downvote with at least a 140 | character reason why. | | READ THE FUCK UP. Barnaby was set to talk at defcon about | killing pacemakers remotely... and he was also able to | hack other medical devices. | | ( _HN rules say you shouldnt complain about downvotes! - | screw that, should I have to give the full historical | context if someone doesnt know what I am talking about. | | I almost NEVER downvote people. Its not helpful, because | a lot of downvoters may not have a deeper context of | connection..._) | sgtnoodle wrote: | Lol. I've certainly already made the joke that embedded | systems are dear to my heart. I'd consider working a few | years at a place like Medtronic just to see what I can | contribute, but on the other hand I hear there's roughly | a 2:1 ratio between requirements and lines of code. | | Going through airport security is fun just because the | TSA agents overreact as if the metal detector is going to | kill me. | samstave wrote: | DYSTOPIAN OUTCOME: | | /u/sgtnoodle has accepted a great job with MedTronic, | little does he know, that as a QA process embedded | engineer, his duties require him to monitor various labs | - including the PENTEST/AGGRESSIVE attack lab... but the | anechoic chamber contract was low bid - and has leaks... | | As he walks by the lab, checking his tablet for his | various checklists... there is a leak. | | A deadly leak... As he rounds Corridor-4A toward his | desk, the leak hits him. | | As a Class-I Mk2 Embedded engineer, he was susceptible to | the RF attacks... | | We only found him after the alarm sounded that he badged | through Door X1A, but never made it to Door TR3B where | his lab was... | | Cardiac failure due to failed electro-stim documented as | cause of termination of employment. | LastTrain wrote: | You are getting downvoted for the conspiracy theory | aspect of your post and for throwing shade on a guy with | the pacemaker. If you care about being liked, say | likeable things. | samstave wrote: | You're getting a FU from me for even using the term | "conspiracy theory" as you adopt its MSM meaning... | | You clearly did not grasp what I said. | | Fucking think. (13 days vs >13 years) | alphaoverlord wrote: | If you have complete AV block, a leadless pacemaker is | less good than one with multiple leads, since it allows | pacing multiple chambers and maintaining synchrony | between A and V. | animatedb wrote: | There are now leadless devices that communicate with each | other using RF. | lake-view wrote: | > Maybe my cardiologist is just trying to make me feel | good, but he says my leads will likely last 30-50 years. | Intuitively that seems unlikely, but we'll see. It's got | to be one of the most engineered cables in existence. | | One of my favorite learnings in school was about the | "Endurance limit". | | Some materials, like aluminum, will eventually fail under | cyclic loading even at tiny, tiny loads. This was a big | problem when they built the first passenger jets. Other | materials, like steel, have a threshold at which they can | be cycled _indefinitely_ without issue. | | For something like a pacemaker, I like to imagine they | dialed the materials and forces to be within such a | threshold so you can keep on ticking! | tengwar2 wrote: | Re passenger jets - I imagine you are thinking of the | Comet 1? That was a more complex failure than is | generally known. In brief, they did know about fatigue | life at the time, and had ways of retiring aircraft | before it was an issue (safe-life design, apparently | introduced in the 19C for steam engines despite their | being iron and steel). Ok, now you will be thinking | "square windows, stress concentrators". Almost all | pressurised aircraft use windows with angled corners in | the cockpit. There isn't an intrinsic bar to square | windows, and in fact the original design would probably | have been ok. That used glued installation, avoiding | stress concentrators. However a production engineer | changed the design to use riveted installation, which | caused the well-known problem with hull failure. Still, | that would have been discovered if DH had not managed to | resist government pressure to do fatigue testing on the | pressure hull (because they were racing Boeing to be | first to market, and fatigue testing takes time). They | actually had the apparatus for repeatedly pressurising | the hull in a bath, but only used it for testing static | pressure. | tomrod wrote: | Meh. Maintenance is a good thing when performed well and not | excessively. | | Heart problems are funky. | konschubert wrote: | I read this as: | | Most patients don't survive those 10 years anyways. | kristopolous wrote: | I'd rather live an extra 9 years than 0. | | We're all going to die and an extra 9 years is not bad. | dghughes wrote: | My Dad was diagnosed with a fatal lung illness and was | given three years to live. He made it to ten years the | last six months were rough. But I can't imagine if he had | died after the predicted three years. | | I see people Dad's age or older driving and walking | around and I find it amazing how older people are alive. | Elderly people are amazing as people and for their | knowledge. | | Love every day you and your family are here and healthy! | konschubert wrote: | I did not mean to say that they are not worth it. | mlyle wrote: | A number don't. But as far as the number that needs some | kind of pacemaker tune-up or revision during that time-- | it's a really big share. | sgtnoodle wrote: | If battery life doesn't improve much, I don't die | prematurely, and I continue to materially benefit from | having an implant, I personally could be realistically | looking at 3 replacement devices and at least one lead | replacement over the years. In the unlikely event that I | suffer from ventricle enlargement long term, I'd need two | more leads installed as well. | mlyle wrote: | Yup, there's definitely some patients that would benefit | from a nuclear battery. | | > I personally could be realistically looking at 3 | replacement devices and at least one lead replacement | over the years. In the unlikely event that I suffer from | ventricle enlargement long term, I'd need two more leads | installed as well. | | This is the point I'm making, though: realistically, you | have a high chance of needing 2 additional procedures for | non-battery reasons, which are likely good times to | replace the device, too. | jjkaczor wrote: | My grandfather got a pacemaker in the late 1970's. | | He died in 2014, not from heart-related issues. | | I'd say that was a good return on medical investment. | WastingMyTime89 wrote: | The figures surrounding pacemakers are hard to interpret. | Most people are fitted extremely late in their life | following serious cardiac incidents. | | My understanding is that people diagnosed with bradycardia | young can expect to survive a long time with the device. | konschubert wrote: | You are right. When you read the studies, they seem | gloom. But of course, most people who are fitted a | pacemaker are already very late in their life. | patrickserrano wrote: | Glad I'm not the only cynical one ;) | KerrAvon wrote: | Seems like maybe don't be cynical outside of your own | specialty might be a lesson here. | toss1 wrote: | A friend had one of these units that extended his life for | over a decade. He had it upgraded at least once, and the | programing updated several times, and noted improvements each | time (although he never got the one feature he really wanted | [0]). So active maintenance is definitely not spurious or | mercenary but is genuinely useful. | | [0] When the pacemaker detected a problematic arrhythmia it | would give a couple of defibrillation shocks just like the | paddles but right on the heart muscle. He said this felt like | getting kicked in the chest by a horse and came completely | out of the blue with zero warning. So it could be quite | disruptive. He wanted a feature where it would tingle or beep | or something just a few seconds ahead of time so he could | mentally prepare; apparently the second one that was expected | was a lot less traumatic. Anyway, the docs thought it was a | good idea, and passed it up, but it never happened before he | passed. | WastingMyTime89 wrote: | That's an implantable cardiac defibrillator not a | pacemaker. Completely different things. | toss1 wrote: | It had both functions, at least according to my friend; | he was an engineer and he described both in some detail. | leeoniya wrote: | > He wanted a feature where it would tingle or beep or | something just a few seconds ahead of time so he could | mentally prepare; apparently the second one that was | expected was a lot less traumatic. | | reminds me of the pre-safe sound prior to collision | | https://www.mercedesbenzofnatick.com/new-features- | mercedes-b... | toss1 wrote: | Yes, it does -- Thx for reminding me of that! | bobbob1921 wrote: | I'm not clear on what he was supposed to do in response to | this. Is it a situation where if he were to sit down and | relax he could resolve the arrhythmia? Or is this a | notification mechanisms that he can then alert his doctors? | (My question is why was this designed to be an extreme | "notification ")? | toss1 wrote: | He just wanted some kind of warning to get himself | mentally prepared or braced for the kick - maybe take a | quick breath, pull out of the way a tool he's using, | whatever, or just reduce the surprise factor. As he said, | the second one that he knew was coming was not such a big | deal. It was definitely not to try to resolve it, that | was up to the pacemaker/defib. | happyopossum wrote: | There's not a single cardiac surgeon in the world who thinks | he's gonna get rich with once-every-10-years follow up | appointments. We produce enough new patients to keep them all | sufficiently busy. | robocat wrote: | A private surgery business that specialised in pacemakers | would surely care, because those 10yr repeat customers | would be part of the valuation (valued like SaaS with long | duration and high churn?). That would matter to a surgeon | with an ownership stake on retirement. | | I agree that a surgeon at a general hospital probably | wouldn't care (little financial incentive). | Calavar wrote: | Private practice is quickly going extinct in the US. It's | generally not an option for US residency and fellowship | graduates these days unless they are in one of the | specialties that has cash payors (plastics, dermatology, | orthopedics, a small number of "concierge" primary care | docs and psychiatrists that cater to rich patients, and a | small number of ophthalmology practices that carved out a | good Lasik business). | | The vast majority of pacemakers are placed by | cardiologists with an additional two years of training in | electrophysiology (not by cardiothoracic surgeons, who | prefer to do complicated open heart surgeries and | generally find things like pacemakers boring). | | Contrary to the conspiratorial thinking all over this | thread, medical society guidelines have _scaled back_ the | indications for putting in pacemakers time and time | again, so the market has shrunk. Electrophysiologists | have to make up for the lost pacemaker volume by doing | newer procedures (ablations) that reimburse less per hour | of work. Even then, the volume at a lot of shops isn 't | enough to merit full time work. A lot of graduating | electrophysiologists have to take mixed | electrophysiology/general cardiology jobs where less than | 50% of the work is electrophysiology. | | All that is to say, no, pacemakers are not a money making | scheme. While there is decent money to be made, it's a | shrinking market and those who got obscenely rich putting | in pacemakers in the 80s and 90s have mostly already | retired. | ecpottinger wrote: | Looked at my scales this morning, boy are you right. | citizenpaul wrote: | >longevity of nuclear pacemakers was excessive | | Same. In what world can a lifesaving device run excessively | long? One with our health system is where... | hkgjjgjfjfjfjf wrote: | rwmj wrote: | Until now I assumed that _all_ pacemakers were nuclear powered, | since I read about this as a kid in some children 's science | book. It's come as a surprise to find out they're unusual. | afterburner wrote: | > Due to the extremely high risk and toxicity involved with | using plutonium, numerous layers and shields were woven into | these pacemakers resulting in larger and heavier devices. | Despite strong concern of radiation exposure, the actual risk | of exposure from these plutonium-powered pacemakers was almost | non-existent. | | What a strange phrase. I would say it was _because_ of the | concern of the risk of radiation, not "despite" it, leading to | the precautions built into the device, that the risk was | reduced to "almost non-existent". | | Or is this a claim that the shielding was unnecessary? | michaelt wrote: | The claim here is "The risk was tiny due to the superb | shielding - but patients were still wary and preferred their | implants not have any nuclear material at all" | jerry1979 wrote: | I think it reads like: | | Even though people might worry about radiation from the | device, the actual risk (due to all the shielding) is almost | non-existent. | ceejayoz wrote: | I'm just imaginging trying to explain to TSA that this is the | reason their radiological alarms are going off... | adenner wrote: | That already happens for other medical uses of isotopes. | bad416f1f5a2 wrote: | I think my step zero would be to pause and ask myself how I got | myself in a situation like this. | jakedata wrote: | The first thing I thought of when I saw the pacemaker photo was | to adapt the miniature RTG to power a digital watch. People have | Nixie tube watches, I want my RTG powered watch. | | I'd use a capacitor to accumulate a charge which would power one | of the really old-school LED digital watches of the early 70s. | | Totally impractical, dangerous and illegal? Sign me up! | aaaaaasss wrote: | bookofjoe wrote: | This is a new record for me: top of HN homepage 20 minutes after | submission | bookofjoe wrote: | Even more annoying to some: still there after two hours | bookofjoe wrote: | Make that three hours and counting | bookofjoe wrote: | Four | bookofjoe wrote: | 5 | bookofjoe wrote: | 6 | rob74 wrote: | So this is the same technology as used in various space probes | and the Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rovers | (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi- | mission_radioisotope_the...), just miniaturized. Fascinating, but | not sure if I would want to have one inside my body... | tenebrisalietum wrote: | Well, if the other option is that your heart won't work without | one, and you are already elderly, why not? | acchow wrote: | Any chance we can get a nuclear-powered iPhone which lasts 4 | years? | gurjeet wrote: | Please stop spreading unsubstantiated FUD. If you have the data | to prove otherwise, please share the links. | | I have had an iPhone 7 for many years; yes, same device. I | don't remember the exact time when I got it, but it might've | been around 2017. So this device is over 5, if not 6, years | old. In all this time, I've had to replace only the screen due | to physical damage, but the phone is otherwise perfectly | functional. I've been told a few times that the battery needs | replacement, but that's primarily because the phone reports | battery's "Maximum Capacity" is 73%; but I'm reluctant to | replace the battery because I haven't had any problems with the | current battery. | | Another data point: I bought an iPad Air 2 in November 2016 for | my kids, and it's been used by my kids, changing hands as the | older one grew out of it, and has had zero issues. Yes, it's | screen has got scratches, and it's got blemishes on the body. | But it's been running along just fine for over 7 years now. | It's getting OS updates, even though it's been discontinued for | over 5 years. I cannot say that for any of the Android devices | I had bought, not even the ones made by Google. | | Before getting the iPhone, I was firmly in the "android is | best" camp, and I was almost against buying Apple devices, | primarily for the cost of the hardware. I have bought phones, | and a tablet, powered by Android, but none of them lasted long | enough for me to extract value out of my investment. Either | they died early because of some hardware failure, or because | the device stopped getting updates. | | After trying iPhone, and Apple's other hardware, like MacBooks, | I have become a fan of the _quality_ of their products. Their | products may not give the customer the same freedoms (of | choice) and flexibilities that we've come to expect from Linux | and Android worlds, but their products serve the needs of their | customers for long durations, and in a way that no other | company possesses the ability to do. | | If you are of the type who pines for products of a bygone era | where the products used to last decades, serving the customers | faithfully without much fuss, I think you should seriously | consider buying Apple devices. | lake-view wrote: | I think they meant the charge lasts for 4 years, not the | phone itself. | gurjeet wrote: | The comment complains about the device itself, and not any | specific components of it. | | > Any chance we can get a nuclear-powered iPhone which | lasts 4 years? | acchow wrote: | I didn't complain about anything. I'm using an iPhone | from 2018, but I have to charge it every day. Would be | nice to not charge it at all from the time I buy it (like | a nuclear power source) | gurjeet wrote: | Your comment made it sound like you were unhappy with the | longevity of the device itself. | | > iPhone that lasts 4 years | | Sorry if that was not your intent. | macintux wrote: | > Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of | what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to | criticize. Assume good faith. | | From the site guidelines. The most plausible interpretation | by far is that the comment referred to the time between | charges; otherwise, what would nuclear power do to extend the | lifespan of a device? | drraj32 wrote: | Just got me thinking: What would it take for us to get to a point | where there are small, safe nuclear powered "batteries", that can | supply enough electricity for a building. | Gordonjcp wrote: | Far better would be a Pebble Bed Reactor, which more or less | fits into a couple of shipping containers and provides a | building's worth of power and heat for about ten years with a | similar level of maintenance as a diesel genny. | MichaelCollins wrote: | That doesn't sound like any PBR I've ever heard of. Which | design are you talking about? | fulafel wrote: | XKCD style what-if: | | We'd need to have a lot of money, a disregard for return of | investment and a lot patience: Current RTGs can do that, but | they're rather expensive for heating houses and problematic | from the nuclear materials POV (waste / profileration), not to | mention the regulatory and licensing for using it a | neighbourhood - better budget the time and money for lobbying | for some legislation changes. | | If by building we mean say 10 apartments, and each needs 10 kW, | the RTG would need hundreds of kg of Pu-238 plutonim dioxide | [1]. | | It's hard to cite the exact cost for that since it's not a | freely traded commodity but that's a lot of plutonium. Eg NASA | said that with a $75-90 million investment they can make 1.5-2 | kg per year of it. [2] | | [1] https://drinksavvyinc.com/blog/how-much-does-a- | radioisotope-... gives 2 kW per 5 kg [2] | https://www.space.com/20774-plutonium-spacecraft-fuel-nasa-b... | klodolph wrote: | It would take some kind of complete revolution. It's not | happening. | | These batteries have very poor power density and are very | inefficient. The advantages of nuclear-powered batteries are: | | - They generate power over a long time, decades, | | - They generate some heat. | | They don't generate much power. If you have a building, you | would definitely think of a nuclear RTG as a "very shitty | battery", and that's even if you don't care at all about | radioactivity. | | Thinking of these as a "battery" is also a bit misleading, IMO. | These are really just small power plants, which generate heat | and turn the heat into electricity. The heat is powered by | radioactive decay of Pu-238, and then turned into electricity | with the extremely inefficient Seebeck effect. If you had a | source of heat you wanted to turn into electricity, it's much | more efficient to use that heat to turn a turbine which is | connected to a generator. And if you want an efficient, cost- | effictive turbine, you make it big. At that point, you have a | power plant. | adrian_b wrote: | While Pu-238 is an alpha emitter, so it is difficult to | capture the decay energy in any other way than by converting | heat into electrical energy, for the radioactive isotopes | that are beta emitters there is an alternative where the | nuclear batteries function in a way very similar to a | chemical battery. | | The beta decaying substance is connected electrically to one | electrode of a capacitor, while the electrons emitted due to | the beta decay are able to pass through the insulating layer | of the capacitor, reaching the other electrode. | | Thus the capacitor is charged directly by the beta-decay and | it can provide electrical energy to the external circuit. | drraj32 wrote: | Thanks for the insights. I was thinking if we can make | nuclear power generation small, it can avoid the stigma | associated with big nuclear power plants. At that point it | might become a viable source of energy to replace fossil | fuels. | srvmshr wrote: | Not related to nuclear, but the startup Bloom Energy was aiming | this by fuel cells. A small box could power a house for a year, | as they claimed. Trouble was the box internals run at very high | temperatures (800degC) and there was potential for things going | awry. | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom_Energy | Danieru wrote: | This is established and commonly installed technology in | Japan. It's called EneFarm. Lots of newish houses connected | to natural gas have these largish boxes out front. The odd | name leaves most people confused. | | The EneFarms used to be heavily subsidized by the japanese | government in a long term program to encourage fuel cell | development and manufacturing. Over time prices have | decreased such that the subsidy is either already expired or | could be soon expired. | | The tech is near, and allows getting a bit more energy out if | natural gas. The gas companies hope it will allow them to | eventually reuse their pipes to send hydrogen. Personally I | think the combo of cheap solar panels and 400% efficiency | heat pumps will outcompete gas. | OJFord wrote: | Just because you pay a positive non-zero amount for less | than a quarter of the energy in, it does not mean that a | device has greater than 100% efficiency, which is not | possible. | | If heat pumps are 400% efficient then log burners in cabins | in the woods are even better. | mminer237 wrote: | All energy from log burners comes from the fuel, and some | ashes remain unburnt. They're under 100% efficient at | converting fuel to heat. You put in x fuel and <x heat. | | A heat pump takes heat from outside the system. You put | in x fuel and you get >x heat. Getting more energy than | you put in makes the efficiency over 100%. | bufferoverflow wrote: | > They're under 100% efficient at converting fuel to heat | | I think only matter-antimatter reaction comes close to | 100%. Burning fuels isn't even 1% of that. | OJFord wrote: | I know. You can't just ignore the bulk of the input and | still call it 'efficiency' though. | | Even manufacturers call this 'coefficient of | performance', not efficiency. | MichaelCollins wrote: | Since precise use of language is so important to you: | | > _" You can't [...]"_ | | He did, so obviously he can. You mean _shouldn 't_, not | _can 't._ | marshray wrote: | An implied qualification of "you can't [while remaining | logically consistent]" is common usage. | cedilla wrote: | Impossible in a closed system. Extremely common | elsewhere. | jackcarter wrote: | A heat pump warms a home more efficiently than using the | same amount of electricity for resistive heating. It can | do this because it's not generating the heat from | scratch; it's moving heat from outside to inside. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_pump#Performance | xattt wrote: | A local company has developed a heat pump with a thermal | energy storage system. Not sure how they do this, but I | imagine there is some sort of insulated cinder blocks on | a secondary loop that shuttles heat/cold to where it | needs to go. | | (1) https://stash.energy/en/product/ | folmar wrote: | They try very hard not to be specific, but the industrial | heat accumulators are usually just water. | OJFord wrote: | I know. It's only >100% 'efficient' if you ignore the | input of 'outside heat'. That is not a normal | calculation, and not really called 'efficiency'. | | It's desirable for multiple reasons, of course, but it's | not efficiency. | pmoleri wrote: | Unfortunately by that metric other electrical heaters | tend to 0% efficiency because they are not making use of | the virtually unlimited energy outside the buildings. | | The 400% metric let's you compare with other heaters, the | 100% is kind of useless. | qbasic_forever wrote: | RTGs have been around since the 50's and 60's: | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_ge... | For example Russia used them to power lighthouses in super | remote parts of their coast. Space probes, mars rovers, etc. | use them too. | fortran77 wrote: | You can buy radioactive exit signs. | | https://www.emergencylights.net/collections/self- | luminous?gc... | | They aren't generating electricity though. | krisoft wrote: | Absolutely. And not without incidents: | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lia_radiological_accident | | Short summary: Soviet engineers installed RTG powered radio | relays to support the construction of a damn in Georgia. | Political instability lead to the abandonment of the RTGs. | Someone scavenged the generators and removed the radioactive | cores from them. | | Two of the radioactive sources were discovered by men | gathering firewood in the forest. They decided to bring them | to their camp(!) and cozy up to them to keep warm during the | night(!!). Despite showing symptoms of radiation poisoning | they kept the cores on their person while loading their | truck(!!!). They all suffered terrible radiation injuries. | | There are more sources "lost" from the same batch which | remains unaccounted for to this day. | masklinn wrote: | Yeah the URSS made routine use of RTGs throughout their | territory (pretty logically as it's so vast and low-density | electrification can't reach everywhere), and those | routinely got misplaced. Things got worse after the fall of | the URSS too e.g. a helo dropped two RTGs from 50m while | airlifting them in 2004. | petre wrote: | Yes, there's a Russian movie with a guy that is guarding a | weather station in the North and playing games all day. He | somehow gets into a conflict with his supervisor, | dissasembles a RTG beacon and uses the Strontium 90 to poison | his supervisor's dried fish supply. They both get irradiated | and the military cleans up the mess. | | https://m.imdb.com/title/tt1588875/ | | Only the Soviets were daft enough to build RTGs using | Strontium 90. | philipkglass wrote: | _Only the Soviets were daft enough to build RTGs using | Strontium 90._ | | The United States did too. | | Oak Ridge National Laboratory technical report | "Strontium-90 Heat Sources" | | https://technicalreports.ornl.gov/1971/3445605716035.pdf | | _Introduction_ | | _Compact electrical generators powered by heat from | radioisotopes have been under development in the United | States since the early 1950s for space, marine, and | terrestrial uses. Essentially all the generators developed | for marine and terrestrial uses have been powered by 90 Sr. | This report summarizes the development work done by Oak | Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Hanford Atomic Products | Operation, and Martin Company, Nuclear Division, which led | to the production of 90 Sr heat sources for use in the | generators._ | | It was a natural choice since strontium 90 is an inevitable | byproduct of operating any fission reactor, and was readily | available as a coproduct from weapons plutonium production | reactors. Making better RTG isotopes like plutonium 238 | required additional infrastructure. | masklinn wrote: | > Only the Soviets were daft enough to build RTGs using | Strontium 90. | | I mean, Sr90 is super cheap, and as long as it stays inside | the RTG you're fine. The AEC actually tried Polonium RTGs | in the late 50s. | | The shorter half-life of Sr compared to Pu also means it's | a bit less of an issue when you lose the source. | amelius wrote: | Nice in theory but what if they fall into the wrong hands? | zdragnar wrote: | People are why we can't have nice things. | Galaxeblaffer wrote: | It's already in the wrong hands | spacephysics wrote: | I saw a video about a recent advancement in nuclear diamond | batteries. Basically look like normal AA batteries but used | depleted uranium and lab diamonds to make them save and long | lasting | duffyjp wrote: | A phone I never have to charge would be rad. | jsmith45 wrote: | Sadly like most similar nuclear powered energy sources this | is very low density, and provides very little power, | despite lasting a long time. Think microwatts. | | Only really viable in deployments that need very little | power, where no other energy harvesting method is | available, and periodically changing out batteries is not | an option. | atemerev wrote: | RTGs can't do that. Compact nuclear reactors, however, can. | | The problem is that a nuclear reactor is a dynamic system, with | some moving parts. It requires thermal management. It requires | dynamic control. It is really hard to design a fully self- | contained nuclear power system which wouldn't require any human | intervention to operate. | | And even if we could, there is also a problem of waste | management. Nuclear waste is not too dangerous, if you don't | touch it. It is, however, quite dangerous, if you grind it into | fine particles and spray a large city with it by a crop duster. | Our world is crazy. There are people like that out there, who | might be interested in it. It is relatively hard to obtain hot | nuclear waste from centralized large power plants. It will be | really easy in the case of small building-scale reactors. | bell-cot wrote: | The headline situation obviously needs an entry or two in the "If | I Was An Evil Overlord" List. | | Best that you not discover that little detail when you're trying | to "seal the deal" with an ultra-powerful Eldritch Abomination, | which you summoned from Far Beyond Mortal Realms, and are pulling | the still-beating heart from your live human sacrifice for that | _kinda_ -critical part of the Horrific Ritual. | | And it's clearly a detail which any Faithful Lieutenant should | check when "procuring" sacrifice victims. And yet another reason | for any survival-oriented members of the Evil Overlord's Legions | of Terror to request postings in distant and sleepy bits of the | EO's Empire - far from the glory and promotion opportunities... | tetsusaiga wrote: | I had no idea nuclear power had been miniaturized to this extent, | wow. | OJFord wrote: | AIUI there's not really anything to miniaturise beyond the rest | of the pacemaker (i.e. ignoring how it's powered) - there's no | 'control' or addition of material as in a big nuclear power | station, it's 'just' a decaying radioactive material -> heat -> | electricity (the inverse of Peltier effect heating, and | presumably just as inefficient (~30%?)). | mullen wrote: | Why not just draw heat from the person and convert it to | electricity? | jadt wrote: | Looks like there has been research done on that topic[1]. | | [1]. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3146093/ | palmtree3000 wrote: | You need a heat difference, not just heat, to generate | electricity. | | Now my sibling comment links to a paper where they say they | can find heat differences in the body that are sufficient | for their needs, so this is still a possibility! But it | does mean you need to be somewhere with a heat gradient: | the paper mentions just under the skin. | Linda703 wrote: | JoeDaDude wrote: | Err... could you make a nuclear reactor with the plutonium in | your backyard? | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn | blossomsflorals wrote: | Bakary wrote: | Tragically relevant story to accompany this article: the Goiania | accident. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goi%C3%A2nia_accident | xtracto wrote: | Ooh, the Cobalt-60 incident in Mexico is also pretty crazy: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ciudad_Ju%C3%A1rez_cobalt-60_c... | | There were _houses_ built of contaminated rebar! The story gets | crazier the more you read about it. | pxeger1 wrote: | It seems like an amazing coincidence that they were able to | work out so much about how this happened. It makes you wonder | how often this happens and noone finds out. | clucas wrote: | Nah, I think it would be more surprising if you _couldn 't_ | track this stuff down. In the industrial and construction | world, everything works off of POs and work orders. When a | company buys or sells anything, there's almost always a | paper trail, and usually some internal records showing what | material went where. If you have the money to spend on the | investigation (and an easy-to-detect signature in the | material itself, like radioactivity) you can probably trace | contamination all the way back to the hole in the ground it | came out of. | reaperducer wrote: | There are people in America who live in houses built out of | radioactive uranium mine tailings. | | https://navajotimes.com/reznews/grand-canyon-gateway- | chapter... | | They've been begging the EPA for help for decades. | joezydeco wrote: | It was a thing in the US too. My favorite coffee shop in the | suburbs of Chicago got a shipment of tables that had | contaminated metal from this incident. | | https://www.upi.com/Archives/1984/04/02/Radioactive- | tables-r... | xtracto wrote: | Yes! apparently the only reason why this thing was | discovered and talked about was because a trailer taking | contaminated rebar to the US passed near a military airbase | that had reactive material detector and detected the | contaminated material. Then the US blew the whistle and | pushed Mexico to do a proper investigation. | | Otherwise, Mexico (my country) being Mexico, I am sure | nobody would have known anything about it. Specially during | that time when we had a "soft dictatorship" that buried all | bad things under the ground (not that nowadays is that much | different...) | | Anyway, thanks for the read, I have always found very | interesting to know the extent of the contamination. | corpMaverick wrote: | My father built our house in Chihuahua city around 1985. We | lived in that house for 25 years. I never thought about it | until we had a case of brain cancer in the family 3 years | ago. | orbital-decay wrote: | There were several incidents like this, ex. https://en.wikipe | dia.org/wiki/Kramatorsk_radiological_accide... | | A caesium-137 source from an industrial sensor has been lost | and ended up inside a concrete wall of an apartment building; | four people died from it. | masklinn wrote: | There were also several incidents from the russian army | just up and leaving orphan sources in the wild when the | URSS failed e.g. Lilo and Lia (both in Georgia). | | Lia was two RTGs, which the URSS used quite a lot, and | which regularly got lost or into accidents e.g. two | degraded RTGs were found in the north of russia in 2003, | one on the Cape of Navarin and one near Kola Bay, and two | got dropped by a helo transporting them in 2004. | | Though from the Plainly Difficult channel, I feel like the | most frequent radiological accidents aren't even orphan | sources but either misused / defective radiological devices | (a la Therac 25), or commercial irradiation facilities | whose opsec degrades until fatal exposure occurs after a | jam. | eloisius wrote: | This also happened in Taiwan. A metalworks reused | Cobalt-60-contaminated rebar and then hundreds of apartment | buildings were constructed with it in the 80s. The government | tried to find and buy them, but it seems that some people | didn't want to sell because of the amount offered. There are | still some of them around. | dqpb wrote: | > stolen from an abandoned hospital site in the city | | Is it "stealing" if it's abandoned? | lIl-IIIl wrote: | There was a security guard guarding the site, and the site | was broken into on the day the guard didn't show up for work. | dqpb wrote: | Ok, that does sound like stealing | baud147258 wrote: | Abandoned means at the time not in use, not that it's not | owned by anyone. | WastingMyTime89 wrote: | I think putting it this way absolves the Brazilian government | too much. What happened is 100% their fault. | | The hospital moved to a new site but as there was | disagreement with their previous landlord they were prevented | to move equipments by the police despite trying to secure the | source which was later stolen and having repeatedly warned of | its danger. | gambiting wrote: | Yes. | zxexz wrote: | I would probably have used the word "scrapped". | | This whole thing was a complete failure of bureaucracy from | that start and the only entities that deserve any blame are | those responsible for leaving nuclear waste in an abandoned | facility after being told about it. | saalweachter wrote: | It's the scary goldilocks of nuclear waste. | | On the one extreme, you have the Elephant Foot at Chernobyl, | which even today will kill you if you, like, go up and lick it. | But it's not going to sneak up behind you, so just don't go | over there. | | On the other extreme you have the release of radioactive water | from Fukushima, which instantly dilutes to nothing in the | vastness of the ocean. Meh. | | In the middle, you have radiation sources like this, which are | small enough to be unnoticed and highly mobile, but clumpy | enough to still kill you dead if you get too close. Unless you | have a radiation detector, you could step on one on your way | home today and never know it. | | Scary! | NotYourLawyer wrote: | There's another scary Goldilocks aspect too, which is what I | thought your comment was going to be about when I started | reading it. | | Stuff with a really short half life is horribly radioactive, | but not for long. Stuff with a half life of millions of years | sticks around forever, but it's not throwing off that much | radiation. But stuff in the middle (a half life of perhaps | decades to a thousand years) can be very dangerous and remain | that way for a long time. | marcosdumay wrote: | > and never know it. | | Nah... You will know it quite soon. | ssizn wrote: | Well, tragic... we are talking scavengers here. | foobiekr wrote: | The kids weren't scavengers. | | There are so many things we could have if we actually could | somehow have faith that the required (for safety, pollution | mitigation, etc.) full lifecycle was actually honored. | | Instead, everything is dominated by lazy jerks. The other | day, I noticed my neighbor's house painter digging a hole. I | said hello and asked what was up, and he said "Yes, I need to | dispose of the water and paint from my sprayer, so I dig | holes and pour it in. Don't worry, I will fill the hole back | in when I'm done." This was in the bay area. | | People just will not do the right thing by default if it is | even remotely more work and for most people, thought is the | hardest work there is. | ethbr0 wrote: | What's the recommended method of disposing of paint waste | water in the Bay Area? | | I'd assume soil sequestration (we're not talking lead paint | here, presumably) is preferable to storm drain dilution? | mh- wrote: | https://sfenvironment.org/article/household-hazardous- | waste-... | | Paint is explicitly mentioned. SF even has free home | pickup for it via Recology. | | https://sfenvironment.org/safe-disposal | ethbr0 wrote: | Is that for all paint? It looks like they only offer | pickup for oil-based paints, and latex/acrylic-based | should drop off: | https://sfrecycles.org/items?words=paint&address=all | | I was curious, because I know SF has a high enough | population:water ratio that stricter treatment is | required, but on the other hand modern non-oil paints are | relatively chemically safe (at worst, probably the off- | gasing parts). | mh- wrote: | Not sure. I don't live in the city anymore but your | comment made me realize I didn't know either. | hutzlibu wrote: | "People just will not do the right thing by default if it | is even remotely more work and for most people, thought is | the hardest work there is. " | | My theory is simply low education. | | Since aeons we burried our garbage and it was never a | problem. It only started quite recently, that our | technology is so advanced, that it simply will not | decompose. But rather contaminate. | | But only a very low percentage of people actualy | understands this. | | So sure, that painter surely was "educated" at some point, | that doing this is bad. But they simply do not believe it. | "Not a big deal, you know". Same with plastic bags, same | with climate change. | | Maybe we should start proper science education a lot | earlier? | triceratops wrote: | Should've reported him. | jcoder wrote: | Is something less tragic if the victims weren't fully | participating in capitalism at the time of injury? If they're | performing a societal function that you obviously think is | beneath you? | kergonath wrote: | Yeah, tragic. They are no less human than you are. They had | no clue what they were doing, like all of us in general. What | fraction of the population is aware of the effect of | radiation and the toxicity of medical sources? How would they | go about assessing the risk in this situation? | | Uncontrolled contamination can also harm innocent bystanders, | in this case children. | ssizn wrote: | I know not to barge into buildings to steal stuff that | doesn't belong to me and that I know nothing about. | NoSorryCannot wrote: | That's right, and it's illegal for rich and poor alike. | That's how you know it's fair. | justusthane wrote: | That is an extremely cavalier take, especially considering: | | > His six-year-old daughter, Leide das Neves Ferreira, later | ate an egg while sitting on this floor. She was also | fascinated by the blue glow of the powder, applying it to her | body and showing it off to her mother. Dust from the powder | fell on the egg she was consuming; she eventually absorbed | 1.0 GBq and received a total dose of 6.0 Gy, more than a | fatal dose even with treatment. | | Maybe read the article before commenting? | ssizn wrote: | Oh I read it. | DonHopkins wrote: | Maybe so, and I admire the modesty of your proposal, but it's | just not safe to eat the children of poor people if they're | radioactive, you know. | poulpy123 wrote: | Are poor people really humans ? | toss1 wrote: | Right, they are so poor that they are using their what little | knowledge they have to scavenge an abandoned building for | scrap they can sell to feed themselves and their children. | | If you had never been taught about radiation, you wouldn't | know what to do about it either. It is not like radioactive | materials are a common everyday occurrence for everyone. | | What is wrong with you that you cannot see that they are also | humans just like us, and were born into horrible | circumstances that they never got the education to learn | about this, through no fault of their own whatsoever? | Bakary wrote: | I know that low-empathy privileged commenters are to be | expected on HN, but I nonetheless find it impressive that | such a short comment can illuminate so many biases in one go. | pxmpxm wrote: | Flip take : using social media to feign empathy for | abstract contexts - ones that you actually have zero | emotional connection to - is merely how left leaning people | signal their bona fides. | Bakary wrote: | I hear what you're saying but it's helpful to look at | this with an additional layer of abstraction. | | This is not just virtue-signaling in combat with | edginess-signaling for their respective audience. It's | more importantly a testament to prevailing sub-ideologies | within portions of the population. | | Edgy comments in tech forums like these are a signal of | larger-scale class warfare (a loaded term, but bear with | me). White collar techworkers think nothing of building | skinner boxes and ad services all day as they are | rewarded handsomely for it. In combination with all sorts | of other factors, you end up with worsening social | conditions across the board. | | Some guy being nonchalant about dead Brazilian families | and taking pleasure in signaling it is just a | manifestation of overall societal nonchalance about | rights and negative externalities among high-skilled | workers and capital owners. These are real phenomenons | that have consequences regardless of whether I myself | might virtue signal about rejecting them. | prennert wrote: | (do not autoclave) | gilleain wrote: | Do not stare into laser with remaining eye | fallingfrog wrote: | If you have one of those, are you then a nuclear cyborg? Because | that's kind of awesome. | anfractuosity wrote: | Has anyone found the peak power output from the thermocouples, | for this pacemaker? | sgustard wrote: | Properly disposing of an EXIT sign is no picnic either. | | https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/f... | darwingr wrote: | Could I use it to power my iPhone? Frankly I'm fed up with the | need for charging. | jjk166 wrote: | For actual power, no it would be wildly impractical. However | there is a concept of a nuclear top-off battery which keeps | your main chemical battery from draining during long periods | when not it use. So you could throw a charged phone in a drawer | and come back months or years later and it's still good to go. | Good for applications like an emergency kit. | hwillis wrote: | It would take about 50,000 hours (5.7 years) to charge a 10 Wh | iPhone. A solar cell on the back of the iphone would take | roughly a full sunny day to charge an iPhone, with ~2 watts | peak output. | dale_glass wrote: | No. It lasts years because pacemakers have a really tiny power | draw. | | There's not a miniature nuclear reactor in there, it's just a | RTG, which is simple but also very inefficient. So it doesn't | get the crazy amount of power from a tiny amount of material a | fission reactor does. | MichaelCollins wrote: | > _There 's not a miniature nuclear reactor in there, it's | just a RTG,_ | | I believe these are not RTGs (radioisotope _thermo_ electric | generators.) Rather they use radiovoltaic conversion, | probably alphavoltaic conversion judging by the use of | Pu-238. Such devices convert alpha or beta radiation directly | to electricity using semiconductors, not unlike photovoltaic | cells. | | But your point still holds, these atomic batteries produce a | tiny amount of power. | julianlam wrote: | Probably, given the right modifications. | | However I do not trust the public to dispose of recyclable | waste properly, let alone radioactive devices. | adultSwim wrote: | What happens when someone is cremated with one of these still | installed? | na85 wrote: | Standard practice is to remove pacemakers. If you don't: | | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1279940/ | bt1a wrote: | I feel like this PSA would be best suited for a different type of | hackers | kurupt213 wrote: | It's always the seemingly normal people with the weird hobbies | ToddWBurgess wrote: | If it is a dead body and it is being cremated you take it out so | it doesn't explode in the crematorium. I say this as a former | funeral director who had to remove them. | bookofjoe wrote: | >Pacemaker explosions in crematoria: problems and possible | solutions | | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1279940/ | inciampati wrote: | Fascinating read and a lovely example of a simple and | pragmatic socioscientific study. Cool! | masklinn wrote: | I assume it's mostly an issue with the li-ion battery | pacemakers? Plutonium wouldn't explode, though the casing may | crack which would be less than ideal. | Vaslo wrote: | Was just coming here to ask this - thanks for the info! | alasdair_ wrote: | "It was the day my grandmother exploded." | | Thus begins one of my favorite Ian Banks novels, starting with | exactly this event. | mabbo wrote: | HackerNews truly does pull from a large swatch of interesting | people, doesn't it? | kierkegaard_s wrote: | boiling it down, what would you say is the link between most | common HNers? | MKais wrote: | Curiosity. | thomascgalvin wrote: | Internet access. | incognition wrote: | Reductio ad absurdum | ricardo81 wrote: | 'what if' | hathawsh wrote: | Even if HN mostly consists of people engaged in building or | maintaining technology, technology is in every industry, so | the discussion can credibly touch nearly every topic with | some interesting depth. | callalex wrote: | Taking the question literally? People who believe democracy | makes correct choices. | barrysteve wrote: | Desire for quality news | elromulous wrote: | Nit: the idiom is "large swath" | elliekelly wrote: | I'm curious whether it was standard practice for you to check | for a pacemaker prior to cremation or whether the process | relied on a family member informing you? | lucakiebel wrote: | The doctors that sign off the cremation have to provide info | on pacemakers/artificial joints and so on to the crematorium | landofredwater wrote: | > artificial joints | | Would you have to remove the joints as well then? How are | you meant to properly dispose of something like a knee or a | hip? | lucakiebel wrote: | Make it a modern art piece? Titanium hips look pretty | dope | lucakiebel wrote: | But, for real, there's companies that recycle artificial | joints. | jrockway wrote: | Autoclave and sell for scrap? | klyrs wrote: | Vaguely related, the crematorium stole my grandpa's gold | fillings, much to my grandmother's dismay. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-09-02 23:00 UTC)