Phys.org January 14, 2022 In solid electrolytes the ionic conductivity is often markedly degraded by the fact that the ions get blocked at the crystallite grains boundaries. An international team of researchers (Spain, Germany, USA – MIT, Japan) has shown how light can be used to lower the barrier height that ions encounter at grain boundaries and enhance the flow of the ions by orders of magnitude by optimizing the system. They demonstrated the effect of light on the movement of oxygen ions through solid electrolyte composed of ceria and gadolinium. According to the researchers the process can be applied […]
Category Archives: Battery technology
Superabsorption unlocks key to next-generation quantum batteries
Phys.org January 17, 2022 It is theoretically possible that the charging power of quantum batteries increases faster than the size of the battery which could allow new ways to speed charging. An international team of researchers (Australia, UK, Italy) built several wafer-like microcavities of different sizes containing organic semiconductor materials that store energy. They contained different numbers of organic molecules. Each was charged using a laser. Underlying the superabsorbing effect of the quantum batteries is the idea that all the molecules act collectively through quantum superposition. As the microcavity size increased and the number of molecules increased, the charging time […]
Molecular paddlewheels propel sodium ions through next-generation batteries
Science Daily January 11, 2022 Identifying and controlling the pertinent phonon modes coupled most strongly with ionic conductivity, and assessing the role of anharmonicity, could pave the way for discovering and designing new solid electrolyted (SEs) via phonon engineering. A team of researchers in the US (Duke University, University of Louisville, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Argonne National Laboratory) investigated phonons in sodium thiophosphate (Na3PS4) and their coupling to fast Na diffusion and identified that anharmonic soft modes at the Brillouin zone boundary of the anharmonically stabilized cubic phase constitute key phonon modes that control the Na diffusion process in Na3PS4. […]
Scientists reduce all-solid-state battery resistance by heating
Science Daily January 7, 2022 The interface between the positive electrode and solid electrolyte in an all-solid state battery shows a large electrical resistance, and the resistance increases when the electrode surface is exposed to air, degrading the battery capacity and performance. Researchers in Japan demonstrated that drastic reduction of the resistance is achievable by annealing the entire battery cell. Exposing the LiCoO2 positive electrode surface to H2O vapor increases the resistance by more than 10 times (to greater than 136 Ω cm2). The magnitude can be reduced to the initial value (10.3 Ω cm2) by annealing the sample in […]
Revitalizing batteries by bringing ‘dead’ lithium back to life
Science Daily January 4, 2022 Because i-Li loses electrical connection with the current collector, it has been considered electrochemically inactive or ‘dead’ in batteries. A team of researchers in the US (Stanford University, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory) showed that i-Li is highly responsive to battery operations, owing to its dynamic polarization to the electric field in the electrolyte. Simultaneous Li deposition and dissolution occurs on two ends of the i-Li, leading to its spatial progression toward the cathode (anode) during charge (discharge). Through their results they showed that the progression rate of i-Li is mainly affected by its length, orientation, […]
MIT engineers produce the world’s longest flexible fiber battery
MIT News December 20, 2021 Fibers as fundamental building blocks of fabrics and 3D-printed objects provide unique opportunities for developing pervasive multidimensional power systems. An international team of researchers (USA – MIT, US Army, South Korea) has developed a Li-ion battery fiber, fabricated using a thermal drawing method which occurs with simultaneous flows of multiple complex electroactive gels, particles, and polymers within protective flexible cladding. This top-down approach allows to produce fully functional and arbitrarily long lithium-ion fiber batteries. The continuous 140 m fiber battery demonstrated a discharge capacity of ∼123 mAh and discharge energy of ∼217 mWh. The scalability […]
Sodium-based material yields stable alternative to lithium-ion batteries
Science Daily December 6, 2021 In earlier sodium batteries the anode would grow dendrites that can cause the battery to electrically short and even catch fire or explode. A team of researchers in the US (UT Austin, Los Alamos National Laboratory) developed a new anode material, sodium antimony telluride intermetallic — Na metal composite (NST-Na), by rolling a thin sheet of sodium metal onto an antimony telluride powder, folding it over on itself, and repeating many times. This process results in a very uniform distribution of sodium atoms that makes it less likely to form dendrites or surface corrosion than […]
‘Anti-aging’ chemistry taken from nature overcomes next-gen lithium battery decay
Phys.org November 15, 2021 Degradation occurs pretty much everywhere in nature since oxygen is one of the elements most capable of attracting electrons from other atoms and molecules. Organisms often produce different types of enzymes that work to scavenge active oxygen and free radicals to alleviate the issue. Inspired by the anti-oxygen coping mechanisms in nature researchers in China developed a photostabilizer—a simple, anti-aging binder additive to the electrolyte that can scavenge the singlet oxygen atoms and free radicals as they occur. Through experimental investigation and theoretical calculation, they found that the scavenging mechanism in layered transition metal oxides-based lithium […]
Ultrafast charging of batteries using fully new anode material
Nanowerk November 15, 2021 Nanosizing of active electrode material is a common strategy to increase the effective lithium-ion diffusion transport rate, but it also decreases the volumetric energy/power density and stability of the battery. An international team of researchers (the Netherlands, China, Germany) has demonstrated nickel niobate (NiNb2O6) as a new intrinsic high-rate anode material for lithium-ion batteries without the requirement of realizing nano-architectures. The NiNb2O6 host crystal structure exhibits only a single type of channel for lithium-ion intercalation and can be fully lithiated with a capacity of about 244 mAh g−1 at low current densities. A high diffusion coefficient […]
An electrolyte design strategy for making divalent metal batteries
Phys.org October 8, 2021 Rechargeable magnesium and calcium metal batteries (RMBs and RCBs) are promising alternatives to lithium-ion batteries because of the high crustal abundance and capacity of magnesium and calcium. But they are plagued by sluggish kinetics and parasitic reactions. A team of researchers in the US (USA – University of Maryland, US Army, China) found a family of methoxyethyl-amine chelants that greatly promote interfacial charge transfer kinetics and suppress side reactions on both the cathode and metal anode through solvation sheath reorganization, thus enabling stable and highly reversible cycling of the RMB and RCB full cells with energy […]