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Microbatteries Built on a Bed of Nails
nadamsieee writes "The good folks at IEEE Spectrum have a news brief about a newly invented method of creating microbatteries using an electrode that looks like a bed of nails. The method was created by a team led by Prof. Marc Madou of UC Irvine. IEEE Spectrum notes that 'according to the researchers, a battery using such an electrode can generate 78 percent more power than a stacked-plate microbattery of the same volume.'"
This is the same tech in all modern batteries. Increase surface area and you get more reaction. No different to heatsinks, it's been known for years.
Nothing to see here, Move along.
RST
You get amp-hours based on the quantity of reactants that you have. What these guys have created is a way to discharge a small battery more quickly.
OK so sometimes you do need a battery with a low internal resistance. Trying to use this for something like a hearing aid wouldn't help very much. If you could make a smaller battery, then it wouldn't last as long.
As someone above already mentioned a perfect application for a higher power-density battery is hybrid/electric cars. The guys over at acpropulsion.com, while having recently switched to Lithium Ion batteries (some ridiculous number of cells) had a very swift car (oversized go-kart of a kit car) put together with, if I recall correctly, 22 lead acid batteries. The car could go 100 miles on the energy in those batteries but the reason they had 22 was not for the range, it was for the power output.
Their motor system draws about 200kW (roughly 260 horsepower). Looking at the Optima Yellow Top (the specific battery model they were using, I believe) specifications we see the rated KW output of 9.0 per battery. 9*22=198KW.
~Lake