Efficient conversion of energy from heat to electricity or electricity to cooling is closer today than ever before, with a new breakthrough in nanotechnology engineering techniques.

Power Chips plc (PWCHF) and Cool Chips plc (COLCF), both majority-owned subsidiaries of Borealis Exploration Limited (BOREF), announce that they have received a breakthrough patent covering the use of highly efficient electron thermotunnelling to produce either electrical power or cooling. The patent, titled “Thermionic Vacuum Diode Device With Adjustable Electrodes” No. 6,720,704 was issued by the US Patent Office on April 13th 2004.

Power Chips™ are small wafer-like devices that use quantum mechanical tunnelling to convert heat to electrical current. Cool Chips™ are similar in construction, but operate in reverse, using electricity to pump heat from one side of the wafer to the other, enabling efficient active cooling.

Both devices consist of two electrodes separated by a tiny gap of less than ten nanometers. In addition, the surfaces of the two electrodes must match each other to within a few atoms, so that where there is a slight roughness, for example, a tiny pit in the surface of one electrode, the other must have a corresponding protrusion to match it.

The patent includes a description of the techniques used to create such conformal surfaces. The patent also discloses how to create the tiny gap and maintain it even while the device heats up or is subject to sudden shocks. These include the use of piezo elements to automatically adjust the spacing between the electrodes.
Creating the gap is done by coating an electrode with several films of different materials, thin enough to replicate any surface irregularities. The centre film is then removed by evaporation or dissolving, leaving two surfaces with matching irregularities. The materials involved are not expensive, and the patent refers to tungsten, lead and aluminium as possible candidates.

It was recently announced that the research team has reported the consistent production of electrode pairs with work functions of 0.9eV or less. This is being achieved with a 90% or better success rate using techniques similar to those described in the patent. It was also announced that a prototype production installation has been acquired which, once packaging solutions have been completed and production has commenced, can meet a substantial part of the initial military and aerospace demand for Cool Chips.

Isaiah Cox, President of Power Chips plc, said: “This is a breakthrough technology by any definition of the word. The ability to engineer and manipulate such a tiny gap between electrodes has been the crucial achievement in bringing this exciting technology from theory to reality. This ‘Pioneer Patent’, which is one of many patents held for these technologies, was first applied for in 1997. It is a part of our world-wide research and development activities focused on the efficient conversion of energy from heat to electricity or electrici

ty to cooling using our breakthrough nanotechnology engineering techniques.”
Power Chips plc (PWCHF) will apply the tunnelling technology for power generation applications. Power Chips™ are projected to produce electric power more efficiently and less expensively than existing or emerging technologies. A business plan can be obtained at http://www.powerchips.gi/BusinessPlan.shtml
Cool Chips plc was formed in 1996 to develop and market the Cool Chip™, a wafer-thin disc designed to produce cooling or refrigeration through the use of quantum electron tunnelling across a nanometer-scale gap.

Cool Chips plc (COLCF) and Power Chips plc (PWCHF), both based in Gibraltar, are majority-owned subsidiaries of Borealis Exploration Limited (BOREF). Cool Chips plc had 8,250,000 and Power Chips plc had 8,000,000 shares outstanding at 31 March, 2004.

The technology is protected by an extensive portfolio of patents, both issued and pending. More information, including the full text of issued patents, is available on the Cool Chips plc web site at http://www.coolchips.gi and the Power Chips plc web site at http://www.powerchips.gi

Borealis Exploration Limited (BOREF) is a research and development company founded in 1968 and based in Gibraltar in the European Union. Borealis' business is reinventing the core technologies used by basic industries, including electric motors, steelmaking, electrical power generation, and cooling and refrigeration.

For more information and forward looking statements please visit its web site at www.borealis.gi.

For further information please contact:
Power Chips plc
Cool Chips plc
Chris Bourne
Head of Public Relations
email: pr@powerchips.gi
Tel: +44 (0)20 8571 5216