Battery News

Lithium-ion batteries power devices that billions of people use every day — from electric cars to smartphones and laptops. The rising demand for these batteries created a need for alternative technologies with potentially lower material costs. A promising class of batteries based on sodium and potassium ions offer new options, especially for uses that don’t require maximum energy and power. But safety and longevity issues have held back their widespread commercial adoption.

For years, researchers have aimed to learn more about a group of metal oxides that show promise as key materials for the next generation of lithium-ion batteries because of their mysterious ability to store significantly more energy than should be possible. An international research team, co-led by The University of Texas at Austin, has cracked the code of this scientific anomaly, knocking down a barrier to building ultra-fast battery energy storage systems.

An abundant, organic material found in industrial dyes could be the key to advancing a type of battery with promise for storing and deploying large quantities of renewable energy. New research from The University of Texas at Austin’s Cockrell School of Engineering introduces new materials using azobenzene to open the door for “high-capacity, long-life non-aqueous flow batteries.”

For decades, researchers have looked for ways to eliminate cobalt from the high-energy batteries that power electronic devices, due to its high cost and the human rights ramifications of its mining. But past attempts haven’t lived up to the performance standards of batteries with cobalt.

Researchers in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin have built a new type of battery that combines the many benefits of existing options while eliminating their key shortcomings and saving energy. Most batteries are composed of either solid-state electrodes, such as lithium-ion batteries for portable electronics, or liquid-state electrodes, including flow batteries for smart grids. The UT researchers have created what they call a “room-temperature all-liquid-metal battery,” which includes the best of both worlds of liquid- and solid-state batteries.

Lithium-sulfur batteries have been hailed as the next big step in battery technology, promising significantly longer use for everything from cellphones to electric vehicles on a single charge, while being more environmentally sustainable to produce than current lithium-ion batteries. However, these batteries don’t last as long as their lithium-ion counterparts, degrading over time.

John B. Goodenough, professor in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin, has been awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize in chemistry — jointly with Stanley Whittingham of the State University of New York at Binghamton and Akira Yoshino of Meijo University — “for the development of lithium-ion batteries.”

The elimination of cobalt — an expensive chemical component currently required to power our smartphones and laptops — from lithium-ion batteries has been the goal of Texas Engineer Arumugam Manthiram for much of his career.

Researchers in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin have discovered a family of anode materials that can double the charge capacity of lithium-ion battery anodes — a breakthrough that opens the door to cheaper, smaller and lighter batteries in the future.

A team of engineers led by 94-year-old John Goodenough, professor in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin and co-inventor of the lithium-ion battery, has developed the first all-solid-state battery cells that could lead to safer, faster-charging, longer-lasting rechargeable batteries for handheld mobile devices, electric cars and stationary energy storage.

The Department of Energy has selected Battery500, a national consortium led by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) and including Arumugam Manthiram of The University of Texas at Austin as its chief scientist, to help lead a new five-year, $50 million initiative to advance battery technology in electric cars.

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s Science, Technology and Space Minister Yaakov Peri have selected John B. Goodenough, professor at The University of Texas at Austin and inventor of the lithium-ion battery, to share The Eric and Sheila Samson Prime Minister’s Prize for Innovation in Alternative Fuels for Transportation.

Led by the inventor of the lithium-ion battery, a team of researchers in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin has identified a new safe and sustainable cathode material for low-cost sodium-ion batteries.

The National Academy of Engineering will honor Goodenough with the Draper Prize, which recognizes accomplishments that have significantly benefited society.