Extending Next-Generation, Stable Lithium Metal Batteries

Next-generation lithium batteries that offer long-lasting, lightweight, and low-cost energy storage could revolutionize the industry but many challenges have prevented commercialization. Rechargeable lithium metal anodes play a key role in how well this new wave of lithium batteries function, but during battery operation they are highly susceptible to the growth of dendrites, microstructures that can lead to short-circuiting and catching on fire. Now, chemical engineers at Columbia University  have found that alkali metal additives like potassium ions can prevent lithium microstructure proliferation during battery use. They used a combination of microscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance, and computational modeling in their research. The discovery could optimize electrolyte design for stable lithium metal batteries and enable energy storage for electric vehicles, houses during blackouts and power grid failures, and much more.

Transcript

00:00:00 so one of the things that we're trying to  understand in my group is how we can improve   battery safety and longevity and one of the ways  that we go about doing that is understanding how   lithium microstructures grow in lithium-ion  batteries and the beautiful thing with something   like mri or or nmr is we can examine how these  structures grow we can look at at the atomic level   what are the chemical components and spatial  arrangement of these individual species that   have grown on the surface of the electrode  we're looking at individual bonds and molecules   you can also run the experiments in imaging  modes and see different features on the order   of microns so we can actually see these individual  features in an actual individual battery cell the   ultimate goal is to be able to design electrolyte  systems and new electrolyte formulations that   prevent the growth of these lithium  microstructures in the first place