Tag Archives: batteries

Super Batteries

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Some people feel like they are always stuck to the outlet because our current batteries cannot hold enough power and degrade quickly. (c) JuralMin, released under Creative Commons CC0

Have you ever been in a situation where you need to charge your phone multiples times a day in order to maintain its battery level? We’ve all probably experienced times when we desperately need to use our phones but the battery is completely drained, with only moderate use throughout the day. Why is it that current cellular device technology has improved significantly, but battery quality has not?

Recently, researchers at the University of Cambridge have developed a new type of battery that may soon solve this problem and increase the productivity and lifespan of the modern lithium-ion battery. This new type of battery, called the lithium-sulfur battery, takes inspiration from the villi in our digestive intestinal tract. It is predicted that these next-generation batteries could potentially hold up to five times the energy that a tradition lithium-ion battery can, without increasing the size of the battery.

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A illustration of what villi look like in the small intestine (c) nobeatsofierce

Villi are finger-like protrusions lining the intestinal tract which increase the surface area needed for the absorption of nutrients. In the battery, zinc oxide wires stick out like villi from the surface of one of the battery’s electrodes, the part of the battery that generates electrons.

In traditional lithium-ion batteries, active material in the battery that break off the flat electrode are lost and lead to the degradation of the battery. This new villus configuration allows precious “battery nutrients” that break off the electrode to be attracted to the villi wires, just like how the villi in the intestines attract and absorb the nutrients on our food. The material attracted by the zinc oxide wires can then be reused for the production of electrochemical energy, greatly increasing the lifespan of the battery.

The lithium-sulfur battery also has a higher energy density than regular lithium-ion batteries due to the ability of sulfur to hold a higher number of lithium-ions than carbon can in the current battery model. To illustrate this, imagine that the battery is a factory and lithium ions are the workers. The carbon factory only has enough capacity for 100 workers. However, the sulfur factory can have >500 workers. Which factory will be more productive? This is why carbon is replaced by sulfur in the new-type battery, due to sulfur’s ability to hold more lithium-ion “workers” to generate more energy.

These breakthrough changes, substituting carbon for sulfur and the addition of zinc oxide “villi”, result in a new type of battery that surpasses the lithium-ion battery in terms of energy capacity as well as battery lifespan.

“By taking our inspiration from the natural world, we were able to come up with a solution that we hope will accelerate the development of next-generation batteries.” said the study’s lead author Teng Zhao.

However, the battery is currently not yet ready for commercial use and will probably not be available without further research and development.

The new advances in battery technology is exciting and brings hope to all of us who use battery-powered devices. I think it’s about time that the batteries we commonly use now receive an upgrade. Even though this new technology has not yet been perfected, I believe that through the discovery of lithium-sulfur batteries we can move towards developing better batteries for the future.

-Charlie Wei


References:

University of Cambridge. “Next-generation smartphone battery inspired by the gut.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 26 October 2016. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/10/161026102701.htm>.

Graphene Batteries: A Better Alternative

There’s been a lot of fuss recently regarding the new phones. The Samsung Note 7 and the iPhone 7, particularly, seem to exhibit a major flaw: They tend to explode. Well, exploding may be overstating the actual situation, as most of the time they just catch on fire, but it is still quite a major inconvenience.

So why is this happening? Its not like lithium-ion batteries are a new technology, right?

Well, it is true that companies have been using these batteries for a long time now, but the problem has to do with how companies have began to stretch out the limits of the design in order to satisfy its customers.

The lithium-ion batteries work like this:

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Simplified diagram of a Lithium-ion battery. (Image courtesy of Sustainable-nano.)

Where the solution inside the battery helps move the electric charge in and out of the battery.

This these batteries, there are certain limits such as size and charge that dictate the safety and stability of the battery. Therefore, when the companies begin to push the limits of the battery design so that they can give a longer charge, and use less space. What this creates is a very unstable battery, and a very unhappy customer.

So what can we do to fix this?

Meet the Graphene battery.

Graphene is a material that has many wonderful properties. It’s lightweight, conducts electricity extremely well, and is incredibly stable, forming a sturdy yet flexible material. The best part is: it is found in everyday items such as pencils and charcoal, so it won’t be a limited resource either.

Graphene batteries work by using layers of graphene to act as the plates that move electricity in and out of the battery. By using graphene instead of lithium or other metal plates, we fix two major problems:

  1. Graphene holds a much larger amount of charge, and is able to charge up in just a fraction of the time. Pictured below is the G-King graphene battery. At the size of a regular smartphone, it holds more than 3 times the charge of a regular phone battery. Best of all, it can be fully charged in fifteen minutes.

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    The G-King, in all its glory. (Image courtesy of Graphene-info.)

  2. Since graphene is so safe and flexible, it opens up new venues of battery design. Graphene batteries are made in all sorts of shapes and sizes, enabling batteries in all sorts of convenient places.

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    A bag strap with an attached graphene battery inside as a easy to use recharging station. (Image courtesy of Graphene-info.)

Although most graphene products are still under development, expect to see some great results coming through the next couple of years. I, for one, will be sure to pick these up as soon as they hit the general market. In the meantime, you can watch this video about the unveiling of the G-King battery.

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-Dennis Lin, Undergrad Chemistry