In recent years, there are many smartphone manufacturers
offering fast-charging feature in their products. This feature is designed to
reduce the time required to charge the mobile device battery, which usually can
last up to 2 hours or more.
With the fast-charging feature, the battery can be charged
3/4 part in about 30 minutes. But what if there is a technology that allows the
battery charging process is done only in one minute?
The technology comes from scientists of Stanford University.
They create a prototype of aluminum-ion battery that can be charged to full
capacity in about one minute. Not only offers exceptional speed of charging,
its long-term durability is also special. If the capacity of lithium-ion
batteries in general will decrease after passing through 1,000 charge-discharge
cycles, the aluminum-ion battery can last up to more than 7,500 cycles without
reduction of its original capacity.
Aluminum-ion battery is not a new thing. For decades, scientists
had tried to develop aluminum-ion battery, but unfortunately none of them had successfully
created a satisfactory result because the voltage generated was not large
enough.
Based on Hongjie Dai explanation, a professor of chemistry
at Stanford, the key of battery performance lies on cathode material. His team
uses graphite as a battery cathode, which is paired with aluminum anode and
liquid electrolyte, which basically is salt solution.
Looking at the composition of such components, it's not
surprising if the aluminum-ion battery is believed to be much safer than the
lithium-ion batteries that are flammable. The professor even claims that the
battery won't be burnt even if you drill it.
However, some improvements in this battery still need to be
done in order to match the voltage generated by a lithium-ion battery, but at
least the aluminum-ion battery is now able to generate a voltage of 2 volts,
about half of which is generated by lithium-ion battery and far exceeds the
other aluminum batteries performance.
Furthermore, this new battery technology also brings other
benefit, i.e. flexibility, this aluminum-ion battery can be bent and folded,
open the opportunities of flexible electronic devices in the future.
If concluded, the aluminum-ion battery of Stanford team will
be able to bring more benefits than the battery technology that has been used
today. It's not only safe, but also flexible and can be charged very quickly.
The long-term durability is also awesome, at least for the current prototype.
In addition, its cost of production is significantly smaller than the
production cost of lithium-ion battery.