Gas specie electron-jump chemical energy converter
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Accused Products
Abstract
An apparatus and method for extracting energy is provided. In one aspect the method includes using chemical reactions to generate vibrationally excited molecules, such as high-quantum-number-vibrationally-excited gas molecules in a region. The vibration energy in the vibrationally excited molecules is converted into hot electrons when the excited molecules contact a conductor. A geometry is provided so that the excited molecules may travel, diffuse or wander into a conductor before loosing a useful fraction of the vibrational energy. Optionally, the generating and the converting process may be thermally separated, at least in part. The short lived hot electrons are converted into longer lived entities such as carriers and potentials in a semiconductor, where the energy is converted into a useful form.
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Citations
92 Claims
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1-31. -31. (canceled)
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32. A method of producing electrical energy, comprising:
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forming a thin electrically conducting surface on one or more semiconductor elements, the thin electrically conducting surface and the one or more semiconductor elements forming a semiconductor diode;
forming a region for chemical reactions, the region including at least the thin electrically conducting surface;
conveying reactants into the region;
initiating one or more chemical reactions in the region, the chemical reactions producing one or more highly vibrationally excited reaction products; and
removing exhaust and one or more products of the chemical reactions from the region by gas convection, wherein the one or more highly vibrationally excited reaction products transfer reaction product energy to electrons in the thin electrically conducting surface, which electrons become energetic, travel into the one or more semiconductor elements and produce electrical energy. - View Dependent Claims (34, 35, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 52, 53, 54, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 79, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 92)
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Specification