A Thermal Camera Reveals the Secret of the Drinking Bird Desk Toy. A closer look at exactly how the popular desk toy operates. By Avery Thompson Published: Dec 08, 2016 12:29 PM EST.

The kitschy desk ornament's mechanism confounded Albert Einstein. ... If you're familiar with the drinking bird toy, you know it as a cheesy knickknack that's adorned office desktops for decades.

A commercially available drinking bird toy – the generator version definitely has a few more bits and bobs added Frank Vincentz/C.C. 3.0 View 2 Images ...

Although it looked in some ways like a toy, students learned that the "drinking bird" was actually a simplified heat engine. The apparatus was relying on gravity shifts and a series of ...

The retro “drinking bird” is making a surprising comeback — as the inspiration for a clean-energy generator that could one day power your watch and phone.

In this case the surfaces were fixed to the pivoting bird and the stationary stand. The big challenge for the researchers was to minimize the friction at the interface, while still generating ...

Inspired by the classic drinking bird toy, scientists have developed an engine that efficiently converts energy from water evaporation into electricity to power small electronics. The device ...

There are a few ways to harvest 10μW from the environment but, perhaps, none so much fun as a generator based on a ‘drinking bird’ toy built by researchers in China. Dubbed a DB-THG (drinking-bird ...

The retro “drinking bird” is making a surprising comeback — as the inspiration for a clean-energy generator that could one day power your watch and phone.

There are a few ways to harvest 10μW from the environment but, perhaps, none so much fun as a generator based on a ‘drinking bird’ toy built by researchers in China. Dubbed a DB-THG (drinking-bird ...

The retro “drinking bird” is making a surprising comeback — as the inspiration for a clean-energy generator that could one day power your watch and phone.