Heat into electricity

Materials engineer Richard James of the University of Minnesota heats a novel metal alloy sitting on a copper finger; the material suddenly becomes strongly magnetic as it goes through a phase transformation, converting heat to electricity. From left are pictured Vijay Srivastava, Kanwal Bhatti, Yintao Song and Richard James.  CREDIT: Vijay Srivastava, Yintao Song, Kanwal Bhatti and Richard D. James, University of Minnesota  View full size image

This Behind the Scenes article was provided to LiveScience in partnership with the National Science Foundation.

Most of today's power plants — from some of the largest solar arrays to nuclear energy facilities — rely on the boiling and condensing of water to produce energy.

The process of turning heated water into energy was essentially understood by James Watt all the way back in 1765. Heat from the sun or from a controlled nuclear reaction boils water, which then expands, moves a turbine and generates power.