Batteries

An innovative new method of drawing direct electrochemical energy from seawater means underwater robots, vehicles and detectors could go deeper and longer into the unknown.

The GoSun Chill is a portable cooler that, instead of needing to be loaded up with ice, draws on a 144-Wh detachable powerbank for refrigeration (or topping up your mobile devices). GoSun also provides a number of solar panel options for completely off-grid cooling capabilities.

Engineers have developed a new type of hybrid cathode for a lithium-sulfur battery that seems to boast better energy density than existing versions of both lithium-ion and lithium-sulfur batteries.

​They've been used as a rubber additive, a carbon-capture medium and a bioplastic ingredient. Now, discarded eggshells may have yet another use. Scientists have determined that they could be utilized in an eco-friendly and inexpensive form of energy storage.

​We've already heard how batteries that are built into the structure of items – such as cars or satellites – could help extend run times without increasing bulk. Now, the flight time of a drone has been almost doubled, thanks to such "structural batteries."

How we store that energy is a constant work in progress, and while scientists are making important but incremental advances with inventive new materials, others are out to entirely reinvent what we think of as a battery. Here are five of the most innovative examples from 2018.

A new study shows how fluoride might be put to work in better batteries. Researchers at Caltech, JPL, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab and the Honda Research Institute have developed fluoride-based batteries that could potentially last much longer than existing lithium-ion-based devices.

New research out of Rice University describes yet another promising possible solution to the problem of dendrite formation in lithium-based batteries, working a thin film of carbon nanotubes into the design as as way of drowning them out.​

​Electronic devices typically have to be manufactured with existing rectangular or cylindrical batteries in mind – but what might be possible if that weren't the case? Scientists recently created proof-of-concept 3D-printed batteries, paving the way for batteries that could be made in any shape.

While experimental sodium-ion batteries continue to show promise, there are a few kinks to be ironed out before we see them become commonplace. Researchers at Purdue University are claiming to have overcome one important shortcoming by first reducing the sodium to a powder form. ​

As the world warms up, we can’t just keep belching all our carbon dioxide out into the atmosphere. Now researchers at MIT have found another way to reuse this unwanted element – build lithium-carbon dioxide batteries.

Scientists have come up with a way to stop damaged lithium-ion batteries catching fire. The batteries effectively harden on impact, preventing the electrodes making contact and starting a fire.