Stanford Team Creates Stable Lithium Anode Using Honeycomb Film

puddingebola (2036796) writes "A team at Stanford has created a stable Lithium anode battery using a carbon honeycomb film. The film is described as a nanosphere layer that allows for the expansion of Lithium during use, and is suitable as a barrier between anode and cathode. Use of a lithium anode improves the coulombic efficiency and could result in longer range batteries for cars." The linked article suggests that the 200-mile-range, $25,000 electric car is a more realistic concept with batteries made with this technology, though some people are more interested in super-capacity phone batteries.

Comments

Re:More Range Needed

[i kan reed]

Let's be reasonable here. Everyone takes long trips sometimes. Now there's definitely an 80/20 problem, where that long trip 20% of miles becomes an inordinate source of range anxiety, and taking a half hour break every 3-4 hours isn't too much to ask I think.

Unfortunately, we have to convince people that it's a net positive for them, not that it's "not too much to ask". And it's not, unless you count the benefits from every other driver also going electric.

Every month a new battery breakthrough, but..

[parabyte]

...why can't I buy all these wonder batteries?

In the last five years I must have read about at least fifty breakthroughs in battery technology, but nothing of it has reached the consumer (me) yet.

I believe that this is because researchers seem to exaggerate their research results for obvious reasons and seem to underestimate what it takes to make a successful product.

Regarding battery technology I completely stopped to believe anything that comes out of the research community.

Unless I can buy it, it does not exist.

p.

Re:Every month a new battery breakthrough, but..

[geekoid]

A) This story isn't about batteries.
B) This is a big breakthrough
C) Batteries have improved, and some og those things do make t to market. You just don't hear of them becasue they market it's impact, not the technology or science.
"20% longer! " Not "20% longer do to the tech Dr. So N So invented 5 years ago."

Nice to know aircraft carriers, 777s, and mount Rushmore dodn't exist in your wold.

Re:Every month a new battery breakthrough, but..

[Rei]

Except that you have bought them; you just haven't realized it. Energy density of li-ion batteries has grown by about 50% in the past five years. Have you seriously not noticed how cell phone and laptop battery mah ratings keep growing while they keep making the volume available for the batteries smaller?

It's big news when a new tech happens in the lab. It's not big news when the cells first roll off a production line.

Most new lab techs don't make it to commercialization. But a lucky fraction of them do, and that's the reason that you're not walking around today with a cell phone with a battery the size of a small brick.

Re:Every month a new battery breakthrough, but..

[Radical Moderate]

This. Compare today's cordless tools to those of the late 90s. Night and day. The battery revolution has been going on for years, but because it didn't happen overnight nobody's noticing.

I expect Slashdot to trumpet every potential battery break-through because it's new for nerds. I don't expect to find those new batteries on the shelf tomorrow because I'm not an idiot. It's a long road from the lab to the market, most brilliant ideas don't make it.

Re:More Range Needed

[sribe]

In 1973, a Plymouth station age, a station wagon got 7-16 mpg and had a 16 gallon tank. The 256 miles, BEST case.

Yeah, and you could refill it in 2 minutes.