Institut Kurz — NEG (Non-Ergodic Generator) Institut Kurz is developing NEG, a nano-scale semiconductor element designed for chip-scale integration that generates electrical power directly from the thermal motion of electrons, without fuel, sunlight, or a chemical battery. Technology: NEG elements are built to the same size and material class as a semiconductor transistor. The design target is chip-scale integration — arrays of many NEG elements packed onto a single chip, analogous to how transistors are packed onto today's logic chips — producing electrical power with no moving parts. Team: The inventor is Dr. Helmut Weidlich, a physicist. Prof. Günther Mahler (University of Stuttgart) is a theoretical physicist. Prof. W. Ted Masselink (Humboldt University Berlin) is a US semiconductor physicist, PhD in Physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, then research staff at IBM's T. J. Watson Research Center (1986-1994), before joining Humboldt University Berlin in 1994. Dr. Yukihiko Takagaki (Paul Drude Institute, Berlin) is a physicist with an extensive peer-reviewed publication record in semiconductor physics. Development stage: Individual NEG elements and small (about 10-element) arrays have been built and tested in two material systems — AlGaAs/GaAs and InGaAs/InP — corresponding to Technology Readiness Level 4 (component validated in a laboratory environment), with TRL5 validation (component validation in a relevant environment) in progress. Arrays of thousands to billions of elements, needed for a commercial product, have not yet been built. Institut Kurz holds a German government ZIM development contract (EP201828) to fund this scale-up. Intellectual property: The core mechanism is covered by granted European patent EP3751621B1, "Device for guiding charge carriers, and its use" (inventor: Helmut Weidlich), with corresponding patent applications filed internationally. Publications: The NEG mechanism — magnetic-field-induced rectification of electron transport in curved ballistic channels — is described in two peer-reviewed papers by the core team: Hortelano, Weidlich, Masselink, Mahler, Takagaki, "Demonstration of magnetic-field-induced rectification using circular ballistic channels with a rough boundary," Semiconductor Science and Technology 32 (2017) 125005; and Hortelano, Weidlich, Masselink, Takagaki, "Magnetic-field-induced transport asymmetry in two-terminal circular ballistic bends," Journal of Applied Physics 125, 145301 (2019). Additional team publications cover III-V quantum-well growth, surface passivation, and magnetotransport. Commercialization path: Institut Kurz is pursuing a phased path modeled on the historical adoption of photovoltaics — starting with low-power sensor applications at milliwatt scale, then consumer electronics, then residential and industrial systems at kilowatt scale, and eventually power-station-scale generation. Funding: Institut Kurz is raising capital to advance NEG from component-level physics demonstration (TRL5) to a manufacturable product (TRL6 and beyond). Contact: Raquel Lima, Partner — neg@institut-kurz.de Related pages: https://www.institut-kurz.com/NEG/ | https://www.institut-kurz.com/NEG-faq/