Nanobatteries — Safer By Design

Iddo Genuth writes "Conventional Li-Ion batteries have been known to catch fire and explode. A new, safer type of Li-Ion nanobattery that might help prevent such mishaps has been developed by researchers at Tel Aviv University. These nanobatteries should prove useful for various micro devices used for medical, military, and a range of other applications. They are 2-4 years from commercial availability."

Comments

So...

[make dev]

We'll have 2-4 more years of exploding laptops?

Hardly a nanobattery

[Xeth]

FTFA:

Using a silicon or glass substrate, the team from TAU created a matrix of tiny holes each 50 microns in diameter and 500 micron deep.

Atoms are on the order of a nanometer in diameter. These batteries are hundreds of thousands of times larger. Hell, you could probably hook these up with current chip lithography techniques (they're doing tens of microns now). Interesting microbattery, but let's keep the nanotech hype out of it.

Re:Hardly a nanobattery

[evanbd]

You're off by a bit there :) Atoms have diameters measured in picometers; bond lengths tend to be tends to a hundred or so picometers. Current high end chips are made on 65nm processes these days, with 45 and 30 (iirc) not too far off -- but the point is silicon litho techniques do tens of nanometers, not microns. You can get micron level precision with machine tools, even -- very expensive ones, granted, but still :)

I agree completely though, calling this nanotech is a little iffy when you can see the things with merely a strong magnifying glass and resolve details with a decent optical microscope.

wow!

[Lord Ender]

Nano batteries for micro devices? I'm pico excited about this!

'Nano' is routinely abused here

[caitsith01]

I would have thought that a correct use of the prefix 'nano' would involve an object, device or effect, the WHOLE of which is on a nanometre scale. So for example, a 'nanobattery' would be a battery the WHOLE of which is on a nanometre scale.

I'm obviously not alone is being heartily sick of anything involving components parts which are on an atomic scale (e.g.... uh, CHEMICALS) being referred to as 'nano'-whatever. For instance a while back we had this idiotic story about 'lead compounds' producing 'nanocrystals' and being used by the ancient Egyptians.

Next on slashdot: scientists develop nanobreathing technology using a nanogas mixture containing nanoparticles only an few atoms wide! Revolutionary nanopower technique delivers charged nanoparticles to electrical devices through ordinary wire! Nanolightbulbs emitting nanophotons found to have been in use since the 18th century! Nanocar constructed entirely from nanoparticles of metal, plastic and glass runs entirely on nano-fuel only a few carbon atoms long!

Fundamental flaw in logic.

[Short Circuit]

From TFA:

Since each nanobattery is comprised of thousands of small batteries, even if one of these small batteries has a short circuit and fails, the entire battery can keep functioning, lossing only a very small amount of power. Similar damage to a conventional Li-Ion battery could result in substantial loss of power or a complete malfunction and in extreme cases even fire or explosion. So they're putting microcells in a series/parallel network, and claiming that, since each microcell contains minute quantities of energy, a short circuit would result in only minute consequences.

But, again, they've put the batteries in a series/parallel network. They don't mention that a short could take place in places in the network other than exactly across one cell. Let's say an impurity spec lands across a couple wires. Depending on which couple wires, you might have shorted just a few microcells, or you could be shorting out the whole battery.

The reason Li-Ion batteries are dangerous is the sheer energy density. Rearranging that energy with a different battery structure isn't going to negate the fact that, simplistically, you somewhere have two conductors across which is the entire potential of the battery. (Unless you divide the battery into segments and give each segment a unique load. However, that would require a fundamental re-thinking of how electronic devices are powered.)