Sanyo "eneloop" improved Nickel metal hydride battery.
Vastly improved (reduced) self discharge rate.
Best thing about this is that others will no doubt follow their lead 
(patents or no) and the NimH battery will be much improved in the next 
few years.
Surprise claim on 1st link below is a practical capacity in camera use 
of 4+ times that of Sanyo's own Alkaline manganese batteries. That 
doesn't make sense but is worth wondering about.

    - Retains 85% of charge after 1 year.
    - 2000 mAH
    - 1000 charge/discharge cycles lifetime.
    - Being sold as a true dry-battery replacement due to long charged 
shelf life

Best semi technical link I've found is
Not a vast amount of information - charging times suggest similar 
characteristics to normal NimH.

        http://rechargeablebatteryinfo.com/sanyo-eneloop-rechargeable-batteries.php


This Sanyo link seems dead

    http://www.sanyo.co.jp/koho/hypertext4-eng/0511/1101-2e.html

But Sanyo replied to a query from Steve's digicams
          Thanks for your interest in Sanyo batteries. The new
      eneloop batteries have just been announced in Japan. They
      launched them there on Nov. 14. We plan to launch them in
      North America at the CES show in Jan. They will be
      available in the Spring of 2006. We will also be offering a
      charger at that time.


Various low information reports:

    http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,123366,00.asp


        http://www.letsgodigital.org/en/news/articles/story_5065.html

_____________________________________________________

Toshiba Lithium Ion battery that

    - Can be charged to 80% capacity in 1 minute
    - Retains 99% of capacity after 1000 charge/discharge cycles
    - Is ideal for powering flying pigs.

            http://www.letsgodigital.org/en/news/articles/story_2902.html


_____________________________

While we're at it
Toshiba direct methanol fuel cell.

        http://www.letsgodigital.org/en/news/articles/story_4331.html 

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