Graphene batteries: Introduction and Market News - Page 53

Scientists from the University of Alberta and the National Research Council of Canada developed a new material, a 3D sponge-like graphene that can be used to make supercapacitor electrodes. The big advantage o f this new material is a high energy density at ultra high power densities - 7.1 Wh/kg at 48,000 W/kg. This could lead towards supercapacitors that can compete with Li-Ion batteries.

The new material was synthesized the sponge-like graphene out of multiwalled carbon nanotubes and cobalt phthalocyanine (PC) molecules that attach to nucleation sites in the nanotube "skeleton." Heating the material in a microwave for 20 minutes yielded graphite - which was then quenched with ice water to transform it into graphene flakes.

Nobel Prize-winner (together with Andre Geim) Professor and Kostya Novoselov Professor Volodya Falko from Lancaster University have released a graphene roadmap. The roadmap discusses the different possible applications for graphene and also the different ways to produce the material.

The authors says that the first key application is conductors for touch-screen displays (replacing ITO), where they expect can be commercialized within 3-5 years. They also see rollable e-paper displays soon - prototypes could appear in 2015. Come 2020, we can expect graphene-based devices such as photo-detectors, wireless communications and THz generators. Replacing silicon and delivering anti-cancer drugs are interesting applications too - but these will only be possible at around 2030.

Researchers from Lawrence Livermore have developed a new method to mass produce graphene based materials. The idea is to use polymer-derived carbon foams and selectively removing carbon atoms from a network composed of both unstructured carbon and graphite nanoplatelets. This creates a materials whose physical properties can be dynamically changed by an external signal.

The researchers says that the new technique is inexpensive, scalable, and yields mechanically robust, centimeter-sized monolithic samples that are composed almost entirely of interconnected networks of single-layer graphene nanoplatelets. The materials have an ultra-high surface area and may thus be used for energy storage systems. They can also be used as an electrically conductive network to support the active material in battery applications or be used for capacitive desalination.

Researchers from Singapore's A*STAR institute and the US have designed a new way to pack molecule using graphene and graphone (graphene that is hydrogenated on one side) structures. The idea is to use a graphene sheet with a graphone domain that can be used to trap molecules. This is achievable because the graphone region is distorted in 3D to form a cap shape and it is stable well above room temperature.

In the research they used fullerenes as model molecules. It turns out that you can trap several molecules in the same graphone domain. This kind of structure can be useful for energy storage or biological applications.

IDTechEx released a new report (Graphene: Analysis of Technology, Markets and Players 2013-2018 ) on graphene analyzing the technology, market and players in the 2013-2018 time frame. While the material is exciting and has a lot of potential applications, they forecast that the market for graphene will only amount to $100 million in 2018.

The current market for graphene is the R&D sector, but the industry is now gearing up to move to some real applications - which include RFID, smart packaging, supercapacitors, composites, ITO replacement, sensors, logic and memory.

Researchers from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have developed a new graphene based anode that can be charged or discharged 10 times faster than conventional graphite anodes currently used in today’s lithium-ion batteries. To create the new anode material, the researchers took a sheet of graphene-oxide paper and then introduced defects (using a laser or a camera flash) on the material.

The graphene paper, after being damaged, has expanded five-fold in thickness, which means that there were large voids between the graphene sheets. The lithium ions can use the cracks in the paper to quickly traverse the entire sheet - which means faster charges or discharges of the battery.

mPhase Technologies and the Stevens Institute of Technology will collaborate on the design and fabrication of a new battery technology that combines mPhase's Smart NanoBattery Technology with Stevens' graphene-based inkjet printing method for printing electrodes and electronic circuits. mPhase and Stevens will also "explore" the possibility of funding Stevens' graphene research activities.

Back in March mPhase announced they are exploring the printing of its "Smart NanoBattery" using graphene (and possibly other advanced materials), so it's good to know they have now found an R&D partner.

Nickel-Iron batteries (invented by Thomas Edison more then 100 years ago) are very durable but suffer from very slow charge and discharge times. They are used today mostly to store power from wind and solar devices.

Now we hear that researchers from Standford University managed to increase the charge/dischage rate by nearly a 1,000 times - by adding Graphene to the Nickel-Iron mix. In fact, the batteries they developed can be fully charged in two minutes, and dischaged in less than 30 seconds.

Researchers from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University claim that they have invented a new graphene-based battery that runs solely on ambient heat. If this is confirmed, it could lead the way towards a clean, continuous and limitless source of power!

The new battery electrodes harvest energy from ions in a solution - that move at room temperature. The thermal energy of these ions can reach several kilojoules per kilogram per Kelvin. The researchers used silver and gold electrodes connected to a strip of graphene, and a copper chloride solution. Six of these devices in series can produce a voltage of over 2 V - enough to drive a red LED.

mPhase Technologies announced today that they are exploring the printing of its "Smart NanoBattery" using graphene (and possibly other advanced materials). mPhases's battery is just the first of several products enabled by the company's smart surface technology that uses nanotechnology, MEMS processing and microfluidics technologies.