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Lithium-ion Batteries With Extreme Folding Capabilities

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UPCOMING TECHNOLOGY – The idea of bending and twisting any electronic device can seem bizarre and discomforting. But, there are instances when such deformability can be very useful. One of the most desired capabilities while building any compact system is to allow deforming of larger devices and forcibly fitting them into smaller areas, possibly with no loss of intended behaviour and output. Let’s take a look at researches that aim to bring out lithium-ion batteries with extreme folding capabilities.

Origami Lithium-ion battery

The researchers at Arizona State University have built a origami lithium-ion battery with the main purpose to provide foldable solar panels for spacecrafts, particularly to save space (no pun intended!).

The following video shows how high deformability of lithium-batteries is very much achievable, while persisting high quality of output.

Via – [Nature]

Paper lithium-ion battery with 14 times more energy density when folded

Foldable battery
This illustration is demonstrating the possible folding pattern and ability of the battery

How about a battery made out of nanotube-coated paper that can be folded and unfolded like a map? The battery has been demonstrated to produce more energy when folded. Researchers are working on further improving the energy density.

This battery could find it’s use with the popular idea of “flexible” consumer electronics.

Via [PUBS.ACS.ORG]

Elastic/ Stretchable Lithium-Ion Batteries That Charge Wirelessly

These stretchable lithium-ion batteries can power tiny medical devices to be implantated inside the human body. The stretchable batteries within implanted devices could be wirelessly charged.

Via – [NorthWestern.EDU]

Turning Humans And Objects Invisible

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UPCOMING TECHNOLOGY – What is an invisibility cloak? It is a device that can render humans and objects completely invisible. And we’re talking about actual invisibility from sci-fi stories; not cheap trickery. First, we’ll talk about some ongoing non-military researches. Followed by a Canadian company’s claim to have already made a fully functional invisibility cloaking material, exclusive to military applications. 

Active invisibility cloaking

invisibility cloak
The target object is positioned around antennas that emit an electromagnetic field. This field ‘cancels every wave’ spreading randomly from the cloaked object. Photo credit: University of Toronto

One of the researchers at The Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering said (excerpts),

“We’ve demonstrated a different way of doing it,”

“It’s very simple: instead of surrounding what you’re trying to cloak with a thick metamaterial shell, we surround it with one layer of tiny antennas, and this layer radiates back a field that cancels the reflections from the object.”

Cloaking small electrical signals with Time cloaking (Space-time cloaking is currently much more complex and currently a challenge)

time cloak
Photo credit: Prude University

The research is being led at Purdue University. Joseph Lukens, a co-publisher of the findings said (excerpts),

“Time cloaking is relatively new. It’s based on the idea that there are places in time where if something were to happen it wouldn’t be picked up, so no one can tell that it has occurred.”

“Say you have a light beam. Speed up the front half and slow down the back half, and you create a place where the light beam splits apart. There is no light intensity there.”

“If you send a piece of data, but the light beam isn’t there, you can’t make the record. So if someone depicts the absence of light they will think no data was sent.”

Cloaking objects with ‘mirrors and lenses’

cloaking with mirros and lenses
The device cloaks a portion of the chair with a trash can. Photo credit – TechnologyReview.com

Wait, isn’t that what magicians do? Well, the researchers at the University of Rochester in New York acknowledge that this idea has been indeed used by magicians since a long time, but their research adds an layer of ‘easy scalability’. They have devices to unidirectionally cloak a human to something as big as a satellite.

Quantum Stealth

quantum stealth
This material called Quantum Stealth is said to not only remove your visual, infrared (night vision) and thermal signatures but also the target’s shadow. This is a ‘near to real’ mock-up illustration of how the real material would work in reality. For security reasons, the creators cannot show the real material in action. Photo credit: hyperstealth.com

The camouflage design company based in Canada – HyperStealth Biotechnology Corp, claims to have successfully designed a material that completely hides any object by bending light. The creators also claim that the working of their technology remains a well kept secret.

On the company’s official page, they have answered several questions like why it made sense to release this news in public, and questions like could there be a commercial version of Quantum Stealth? And as claimed, the material has been declared classified by the US and Canadian military. With of all these on one hand, there is no existence of a solid proof of it’s existence on the other. Whether if it’s real or another hoax, we would probably never know.

Lithium-ion Batteries Smaller Than Your Finger Nail

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UPCOMING TECHNOLOGY – What is innovation? It is the act of improving something that is already established. The current generation of lithium-ion batteries are widely accepted as a preferred power source for portable consumer electronics. And such batteries have limitations when the overall output capacity, life cycle, safety and the application areas are considered. The following are some important researches from recent times that are aimed to optimise and expand the possible uses of lithium-ion batteries. 

Powerful microbatteries that size up to few millimeters only, and also charge instantly

ions
The illustration shows ions flowing between micro-electrodes in a lithium ion battery, in congruence with the research.

This was made possible by setting a balance between high power and high energy, which is difficult to achieve in the current generation of batteries. These microbatteries are also said to charge instantly, like 1000 times quicker. They could power wireless devices to transmit signals 30 times faster.

And how about using them to jump-start a dead car battery? Yes, that’s on the list too.

The application areas are, but not limited to consumer electronics and medical devices.

Via [Illionis.EDU]

 3D printing super-tiny lithium-ion microbatteries

3D printing has been used to demonstrate the possibility of printing miniature sized microbatteries, similar to a grain of sand. And the performance, with respect to charge and discharge cycles was found to be similar to commercial batteries.

Researchers produced inks for the anode and cathode from separate nano-particles. The 3D printer would then deposit the inks onto a comb shaped material. The battery was completed by packing the electrodes into a container and filling it with an electrolyte solution.

The application areas are both medical and non-medical industries.

Via [Seas.Harvard.EDU]