Recently, it was revealed by the U. S. researchers that they are bringing in use, materials called piezoelectrics, in order to push science closer to self-powering devices, like cellular telephones.

It has been informed by Texas A&M Professor Tahir Cagin and his team that they have made a very vital discovery in the area of power harvesting. It is basically a field that is directed to design self-powered devices that do not require replaceable power supplies, such as batteries.

To be more specific, it has been discovered by Cagin and colleagues at the University of Houston that a certain type of piezoelectric materials can covert energy at a 100 percent increase when manufactured at a very small size -- about 21 nanometers in thickness. On the other hand they display a significant decrease in energy-converting capacity, when constructed bigger or smaller than 21 nanometers.

Cagin stated, "When materials are brought down to the nanoscale dimension, their properties for some performance characteristics dramatically change."

He added, "One such example is with piezoelectric materials. We have demonstrated that when you go to a particular length scale -- between 20 and 23 nanometers -- you actually improve the energy-harvesting capacity by 100 percent. We're studying basic laws of nature such as physics and we're trying to apply that in terms of developing better performing engineering materials."

Recently this research was published in the journal Physical Review B.