Imagine your phone or laptop battery lasting much longer than it currently does, and being safer, greener, and cheaper to produce!
Well, that’s the aim of some really cool science research from China.
A group of scientists, led by Professor Hu Linhua at the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science, has discovered a new way to improve a type of battery known as an “aqueous zinc-ion battery” (AZIB).
These batteries are super safe and good for the environment. They’re also cheap to make, so they’ve been grabbing lots of attention.
But there’s a big issue that’s been stopping them from becoming more widespread – something called “zinc dendrite growth.”
So what are zinc dendrites? They’re tiny, tree-like structures that grow inside the battery and can cause them to perform poorly and become less stable.
They typically grow in one particular direction, known as the [100] direction. It’s like the battery version of having weeds in your garden.
Now, this is where the discovery by Professor Hu Linhua’s team comes into play.
They found out that adding a small, organic molecule, called serine (which is actually an amino acid, like the ones found in proteins) to the liquid part of the battery (the electrolyte), can prevent these pesky dendrites from growing.
How does it work? The serine molecules attach themselves onto the zinc in the battery. This changes how the zinc grows, leading to the development of the Zn (100) texture.
This texture reduces the growth of dendrites and stops harmful side reactions from happening.
The results were impressive! The batteries with the added serine showed really high efficiency (about 99.8%) and lasted longer (over 800 hours of usage).
The full batteries could hold a lot of charge, and they kept working well even after being used a lot (2,000 cycles).
This study is super important because it shows a clever, and simple way to make zinc batteries more efficient and long-lasting.
The researchers hope this technique might be used to improve other kinds of batteries too. So, maybe one day in the future, your phone battery could be boosted with a simple ingredient – an amino acid!
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