One of the biggest obstacles to better electric vehicles and large-scale energy storage is the battery.
Drivers want longer range, faster charging, and lower costs, but safety remains a major concern.
Now, researchers in South Korea say they have found a promising way to build a high-energy battery that is far safer and far less likely to catch fire or explode.
A research team at POSTECH has developed a new type of battery anode that uses magnetic fields to control how lithium behaves inside the battery.
By guiding lithium more evenly, the technology prevents the formation of dangerous structures that have long plagued high-capacity batteries.
Lithium metal is considered the “dream material” for batteries because it can store far more energy than the graphite used in today’s lithium-ion batteries.
In theory, lithium metal could dramatically increase the driving range of electric vehicles. In practice, however, lithium metal has a serious flaw.
As batteries charge and recharge, lithium tends to grow sharp, needle-like structures called dendrites. These can pierce internal battery layers, causing short circuits, fires, or even explosions.
To solve this problem, the POSTECH team developed what they call a “magneto-conversion” strategy. Their anode is made from manganese ferrite, a material that becomes magnetic when lithium enters it during charging.
When an external magnetic field is applied, tiny magnetic particles form and align inside the anode, much like iron filings lining up around a magnet.
This magnetic alignment plays a crucial role. It spreads lithium ions evenly across the anode surface instead of allowing them to pile up in one place.
At the same time, the magnetic field applies a physical force to the charged lithium ions, helping guide their movement. Together, these effects prevent lithium from forming sharp dendrites. Instead, lithium deposits smoothly and evenly, creating a dense and stable metal layer.
The new anode works in a hybrid way. Some lithium is stored inside the material itself, while additional lithium is safely deposited as metal on the surface.
This combination allows the battery to store about four times more energy than conventional graphite anodes, without sacrificing stability.
In tests, the battery showed impressive durability. It maintained extremely high efficiency for more than 300 charge–discharge cycles, indicating that the lithium continued to move smoothly without forming dangerous structures over time.
According to the researchers, this approach tackles the two biggest challenges of lithium metal batteries at once: safety and instability. By preventing dendrites and improving lithium control, the technology opens a new path toward high-capacity batteries that are both powerful and reliable.
If further developed and scaled up, magnetically controlled lithium batteries could help reduce electric vehicle range anxiety, improve charging performance, and make future energy storage systems safer.
While more work is needed before the technology reaches the market, the study brings scientists closer to a long-sought goal: a truly high-energy, explosion-free “dream battery.”
