According to foreign media reports, a team of Chinese scientists at the University of Maryland in the United States recently developed a new lithium-ion battery based on water-based electrolyte that not only meets the required standards for home electronics such as laptops for the first time in terms of voltage, It also avoids the danger of fire and explosion.
In the existing electronic products, lithium-ion batteries are used in non-aqueous electrolyte.Electronic equipment in the battery voltage must meet the 4V standard, but under this voltage, the water can easily be electrolysis, so lithium Batteries usually use organic solvents as the electrolyte, but these electrolytes are flammable and explosive, there is a great potential safety hazard.
It is understood that the team developed a water-based electrolyte battery in 2015, but due to the voltage is only 3V, and the electrode performance will be affected by the impact of aqueous solution decreased.After the redesign of the product, the research team with the United States Xu Kang and other scientists at the Army Research Laboratory developed this upgraded version of a water-based lithium battery.
The researchers through a new type of polymer coating, it has a special drainage, it is coated on the electrode, the water molecules can not get close to the electrode surface after the first charge, the gel breaks down into a stable interface, the Electrodes and electrolytes are isolated to prevent water molecules from decomposing at operating voltage, which not only improves the battery's energy storage and charge-discharge performance but also completely avoids the danger of the organic solvent electrolyte becoming explosive.
Although the new battery voltage has reached the basic commercial level, but compared with the current lithium-ion battery, there are many areas need to be improved.For example, the cost of zinc battery materials is relatively high, and charge and discharge can only reach 50 times to 100 However, it is undeniable that sodium ion batteries, lithium-sulfur batteries, zinc-magnesium multi-ion battery and other battery technologies, as well as electroplating and electrochemical synthesis and other fields, has important reference.
