World's Smallest Battery Created

Zothecula writes "Because battery technology hasn't developed as quickly as the electronic devices they power, a greater and greater percentage of the volume of these devices is taken up by the batteries needed to keep them running. Now a team of researchers working at the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies has created the world's smallest battery. 'It consists of a bulk lithium cobalt cathode three millimeters long, an ionic liquid electrolyte, and has as its anode a single tin oxide (Sn02) nanowire 10 nanometers long and 100 nanometers in diameter.' (Abstract in Science.) Although the tiny battery won't be powering next year's mobile phones, it has already provided insights into how batteries work and should enable the development of smaller and more efficient batteries in the future."

Comments

Developing new batteries

[Space cowboy]

There is a reason why battery technology hasn't developed as fast as the technologies that use them; packing more and more energy into a given volume is a dangerous thing to do. When we pack a lot of energy in a (at least temporarily :-) stable state into a given volume, we tend to call those things "explosives". There's a fine line to tread here, and the more-efficient thing to do is reduce wastage than try to push battery abilities.

We could always use a different form of energy storage, of course, but nuclear powered cellphones don't have customer appeal :)

Simon

Re:Developing new batteries

[Black Gold Alchemist]

There is a reason why battery technology hasn't developed as fast as the technologies that use them; packing more and more energy into a given volume is a dangerous thing to do.

Not necessarily. What you want is something that is energy dense yet kinetically stable. Explosives are the opposite. Explosives deliver small amounts of power really fast. For example, the best explosives (according to wiki) are around 16 MJ/L and most around 3-5 MJ/L. Gasoline is at 34 MJ/L. If you want something that stores a lot of energy and won't explode, look no further than a pile of scrap aluminium. Aluminium stores roughly 83 MJ/L. You wouldn't be scared to have a ton of aluminium lying around behind your house, but that block could store enough energy to run your house for a year.

Re:Developing new batteries

[mu22le]

[...]. Aluminium stores roughly 83 MJ/L. You wouldn't be scared to have a ton of aluminium lying around behind your house, but that block could store enough energy to run your house for a year.

How would you extract power from a ton of aluminum? (honest question :)

How do you charge the world's smallest battery?

[Crash McBang]

Scuff your feet and touch it to a doorknob?

How small is it in layman's terms?

[Kufat]

Scientists tell us that the sheer number of "A"s required to describe this battery would fill, like, a bunch of lines.

Re:How small is it in layman's terms?

[splerdu]

Aaaaaaaaa!: Best wiki article ever.

Really?

[dangitman]

Because battery technology hasn't developed as quickly as the electronic devices they power, a greater and greater percentage of the volume of these devices is taken up by the batteries needed to keep them running.

As they say, [citation needed].

I don't know about the author, but the devices I use seem to have less of their volume taken up by batteries, yet still get better battery life. Compare a 2010 Macbook Air or Macbook Pro to a Powerbook 100. Or in one of my hobbies, electric powered radio-controlled aircraft, in the days of Ni-Cad batteries, they barely used to get off the ground because of the enormous, heavy batteries. In comparison, today's Lithium-Polymer powered craft have much smaller and lighter batteries, yet get more power.