Charge your laptop in a minute? Supercapacitors can help; new research offers clues

Phys.org  May 25, 2024 The current understanding of electric double layer (EDL) charging is limited to simple geometries. An international team of researchers (USA – University of Colorado, Poland) introduced a model to predict electrolyte transport in complex networks of slender pores. Their methodology accurately captures the spatial and temporal dependencies of charge density and electric potential, matching results obtained from computationally intensive direct numerical simulations. Their network model provided results up to six orders of magnitude faster. They used the framework to study the impact of pore connectivity and polydispersity on electrode charging dynamics for pore networks and discussed […]

Breathing supercapacitor

Nanowerk  January 13, 2023 Currently commercialized supercapacitors still suffer from limited energy densities. Taking inspiration from anolis lizard, an international team of researchers (UK, China) has developed a supercapacitor with a “breathing” electrode. To breathe underwater the lizard brings along an air bubble that is attached to a layer of scales on their head. Under water, it repeatedly breathes this bubble in and out. The researchers used chlorine gas which iteratively reinspires in porous carbon materials, that improves the energy density by orders of magnitude. They showed that porous carbon with pore size around 3 nm delivers the best chlorine […]

Low-cost battery-like device absorbs CO2 emissions while it charges

Science Daily  May 19, 2022 The most advanced carbon capture technologies currently require large amounts of energy and they are expensive. Researchers in the UK have designed a supercapacitor that consists of two electrodes of positive and negative charge. They found that alternating from a negative to a positive voltage improved the supercapacitor’s ability to capture carbon. When the electrodes become charged, the negative plate draws in the CO2 gas, while ignoring other emissions, such as oxygen, nitrogen, and water. Using this method, the supercapacitor both captures carbon and stores energy. They have developed a technique to understand the mechanism […]

Researchers design charged ‘power suits’ for electric vehicles and spacecraft

Phys.org  March 7, 2022 A team of researchers in the US (University of Central Florida, NASA Kennedy space Center, FL) has developed a supercapacitor using carbon fiber reinforced polymer (e-CFRP) that can store electrical energy and function as the structural component for the EV’s body shell. Vertically aligned graphene sheets were attached to carbon fiber electrodes on which different metal oxides were deposited to obtain high-energy density electrodes. They fabricated a high-strength multilayer e-CFRP assembly using an alternate layer patterning configuration of epoxy and polyacrylamide gel electrolyte. It delivered a high areal energy density of 0.31 mWh cm–2 at 0.3 […]

Researchers propose method to increase charge of supercapacitors

Nanowerk  December 1, 2021 For ionic liquids, not only are the charge and size of each ion important, but so too are such characteristics as dipole moment on a cation and static polarizability which determines the particle’s ability to get an induced dipole moment in the external electrical field. An international team of researchers (Russia, Germany) analysed how differential capacitance behaves depending on the voltage given the growing permanent dipole moment and static polarizability of cations for ionic liquids and electrolyte solutions. In both cases, the growth of polarizability or permanent dipole moment of cations leads to considerable growth of […]

Laser scribed graphene for supercapacitors

Nanowerk  August 23, 2021 Supercapacitors, which have safe and fast charge (in seconds) and high energy storage are promising for consumer electronics, hybrid electric vehicles and industrial power management. Recently, laser scribed graphene has been increasingly studied for supercapacitor applications. With the laser scribing process, graphene can be directly fabricated and patterned for supercapacitors. Researchers in China summarize recent developments, current challenges and future advancements of supercapacitors based on laser scribed graphene. They summarize facile laser scribing methods for graphene and the application for electrochemical double-layer capacitors, pseudo-capacitors, and hybrid supercapacitors. Recent developments are discussed demonstrating that laser scribing technology […]

Direct coherent multi-ink printing of fabric supercapacitors

Phys.org  January 29, 2021 Fiber-shaped supercapacitors are a desirable high-performance energy storage technology for wearable electronics. The traditional method for device fabrication is based on a multistep approach to construct energy devices, which can present challenges during fabrication, scalability, and durability. An international team of researchers (China, USA – University of Colorado, Carnegie Mellon University, Singapore) has developed an all-in-one coaxial fiber-shaped asymmetric supercapacitor (FASC) device using direct coherent multi-ink writing, 3-D printing technology by designing the internal structure of the coaxial needles and regulating the rheological property and feed rates of the multi-ink. The device delivered a superior areal […]

Wood to supercapacitors

Nanowerk  May 24, 2018 Researchers in China have developed an economical and sustainable method for the synthesis of ultrathin carbon nanofiber (CNF) aerogels from the wood‐based nanofibrillated cellulose aerogels via a catalytic pyrolysis process. They demonstrated that wood‐derived CNF aerogels exhibit excellent electrical conductivity, a large surface area, and potential as a binder‐free electrode material for supercapacitors. The results suggest great promise in developing new families of carbon aerogels based on the controlled pyrolysis of economical and sustainable nanostructured precursors… read more. TECHNICAL ARTICLE