New design of the Li-ion energy and strengthen the capacity charge rate of 10 times

For years, designers of batteries have been looking for the next big thing in technology for storing energy that could replace lithium-ion present in everything from laptops to smart phones to cars. It turns out they may just need to rethink the current li-ion. Northwestern University researchers have redesigned a lithium-ion battery that can hold ten times the battery charge current market, and can load ten times faster. The trick: a redesigned anode that addresses two main issues taking lithium-ion batteries back - carrying capacity and stocking rates. Li-ion batteries work via a chemical reaction in which lithium ions are exchanged between the two ends of a battery (known as the anode and cathode). As the energy is burned by a device, the ions travel from where they are stored in the anode through an electrolyte to the cathode. In the process, the electrical charge is transmitted to the device as ions in the transition through the electrolyte. When the battery is charging, the ions move in the opposite direction from the cathode to the anode. Related articles Batteries of molten metal yield 20 times more current than lithium-ion Power of the Book: Document Turn researchers flexible Lithium-Ion Porsche offers lightweight Lithium-Ion battery in some cars Tags Science, Clay Dillow, battery technology, energy, environment, lithium-ion batteries Anode current design is based on sheets of graphene - an atom thick carbon layers - that store lithium ions. But these anodes can only store one lithium atom for each carbon atoms of six years, a relatively low charge density. The designers experimented with materials such as silicon, which can accommodate four lithium atoms for each atom of silicon, but silicon tends to expand and contract significantly during the charging process, causing it to fragment. This naturally reduces the life of the anode. A graphene-based design also slows the rate of charge. Due to the geometry of the graphene sheets - very thin but very long - lithium ions have to do a long trip on the edges of graphene sheets and then make their way inside. This causes a sort of bottleneck of ions on the edges of the anode and slows down the loading rate significantly. The UN team sawed these problems significantly by rethinking and integrating a hybrid graphene anode silicon design that enhances the capacity and the charging rate at the same time. First, they sandwich layer of silicon between the graphene sheets, allowing a greater number of lithium ions to come to rest there. The silicon is still increasing and ongoing contracts of charge and discharge, but the flexibility of graphene still holds the anode together. Silicon may be fragmented, but there is still in place, allowing the anode to hold a greater charge. The team then used chemical oxidation to drill tiny holes in the graphene sheets - only 10 to 20 nanometers across - for lithium ions can move through graphene, rather than having to go around the edges of the anode (where congestion had occurred). This shortcut allows lithium ions in the anode cell rapidly during the charging process, giving a loading rate shot 10 times in the arm. And only the anode. The researchers next plan to rethink the cathode to further boost efficiency. The best li-ion could hit the market in the next three to five years.