Research on Output Power of Radio-voltaic Nuclear Battery

Abstract

Radio-voltaic (RV) nuclear battery is a device that converts the decay particles from radioisotope sources into electricity, which has inherent advantages of small size, light weight, and long service life. However, its application range is narrow currently, which is mainly limited by its low output power. The significance of this research is to explore the high output property of RV nuclear battery with high intensity energy sources. The material of energy conversion semiconductor unit is AlGaInP which conversion efficiency under 63Ni radioisotope sources are about 2%. The innovation is the using of average energy equivalent method, which equivalent radioisotope sources by adjusting the energy (50 keV, 62 keV, 66 keV, 80 keV, 100 keV, 150 keV) and the beam intensity (5×108, 1.5×109, 1×1010, 1×1011, and 1×1012 e/cm2•s) of the electron accelerator. Analyzing the output electrical property of series-parallel forms. With the increase of beam energy and intensity, the maximum output power shows a linear increase. The conversion efficiency of the RV nuclear battery is about 4%. Meanwhile, if the beam intensity is high, the surface of conversion units will have surface charge and discharge effect, and radiation damage effect leading to a reduction in conversion efficiency. The results prove that with the optimization of preparation process and the activity enhancement of radioisotope sources in the future, it can play main roles in more fields.