Quantum batteries are now a thing – charge in seconds and last for years

The future of self-driving cars is one that requires some serious battery power and that could be coming, thanks to a new quantum battery breakthrough.

Scientists at Australia's national science agency, CSIRO, have created a world first quantum battery proof of concept, which completed a full charge-store-discharge cycle.

Why is this exciting? This represents a huge shift in how batteries work. Currently they're reliant on chemical reactions to delivery charge. These quantum batteries use light and quantum interactions to store energy.

All that means this new type of battery can charge faster and last longer. In fact, unlike traditional batteries that take longer to fill if larger – like in a car – these actually charge faster when scaled up to larger batteries. So this could be ideal for future vehicle EV battery powered options.

Thanks to the "collective effect", as the battery scales in size the charge time reduces. That means the current prototype charges in a quadrillionth of a second – and holds that for nanoseconds.

This is wirelessly powered up by a laser, and then converts light into electric current.

That could mean the possibility of remote charging. Imagine charging while in motion, where cars and drones never actually need to stop to power back up.

Cruciually, this battery charged in femtoseconds and held it for nanoseconds. That's about six orders of magnitude longer.

So, in theory, that could mean a battery which charges in one minute is able to last for a couple of years.

Quantum batteries: when will they be here?

Right now, this is a big step forward in terms of a proof of concept. It comes after this was just a theory, back in 2013, which is a very fast jump forward in the world of physics.

The next step is to increase the size to enhance storage capacity and time. Initially these are expected to power quantum computers or small devices.

So, while this is a huge quantum leap forward, it will likely be several years before we see quantum batteries appearing in mainstream tech to power our devices.