Technique could turn any surface into a lithium-ion battery;
may be combined with solar cells
(June 28, 2012) Researchers at Rice University
have developed a lithium-ion battery that can be painted on virtually any
surface.
The rechargeable battery created in the lab of Rice
materials scientist Pulickel Ajayan consists of spray-painted layers, each
representing the components in a traditional battery. The research appears
today in Nature’s online, open-access journal Scientific Reports.
“This means traditional packaging for batteries has given
way to a much more flexible approach that allows all kinds of new design and
integration possibilities for storage devices,” said Ajayan, Rice’s Benjamin M.
and Mary Greenwood Anderson Professor in Mechanical Engineering and Materials
Science and of chemistry. “There has been lot of interest in recent times in
creating power sources with an improved form factor, and this is a big step
forward in that direction.”