A new flexible, paper-based supercapacitor could power wearable electronics.

The device uses metallic nanoparticles to coat cellulose fibers in the paper, creating supercapacitor electrodes with high energy and power densities—and the best performance so far in a textile-based supercapacitor.

By implanting conductive and charge storage materials in the paper, the researchers’ layer-by-layer technique creates large surface areas that function as current collectors and nanoparticle reservoirs for the electrodes. Testing shows that devices fabricated with the technique can be folded thousands of times without affecting conductivity.

“This type of flexible energy storage device could provide unique opportunities for connectivity among wearable and internet of things devices,” says Seung Woo Lee, an assistant professor in the Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. “We could support an evolution of the most advanced portable electronics. We also have an opportunity to combine this supercapacitor with energy-harvesting devices that could power biomedical sensors, consumer and military electronics, and similar applications.”

(more…)

Every year, around 300 million tires are thrown away in the United States alone. According to researchers from Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), those wasted tires could be used in supercapacitors for vehicles and the electric grid.

An ORNL team led by ECS member Parans Paranthaman has developed a technology that transforms scrap tires into supercapacitors, which could help power the nation and reduce the amount of waste to landfills simultaneously.

This from ORNL:

By employing proprietary pretreatment and processing, a team led by Parans Paranthaman has created flexible polymer carbon composite films as electrodes for supercapacitors. These devices are useful in applications for cars, buses and forklifts that require rapid charge and discharge cycles with high power and high energy density. Supercapacitors with this technology in electrodes saw just a 2 percent drop after 10,000 charge/discharge cycles.

Read the full article here.

“Those tires will eventually need to be discarded, and our supercapacitor applications can consume several tons of this waste,” Paranthaman said. “Combined with the technology we’ve licensed to two companies to convert scrap tires into carbon powders for batteries, we estimate consuming about 50 tons per day.”

With this novel process, old tires are supplying the key ingredient for supercapacitors.

“Each tire can produce carbon with a yield of about 50 percent with the ORNL process,” said Yury Gogotsi, ECS Fellow and co-author of the study. “If we were to recycle all of the scrap tires, which would translate into 1.5 million tons of carbon, which is half of the annual global production of graphite.”

Yarn made of niobium nanowires can be used to make very efficient supercapacitors.
Image: MIT

With the recent surge in wearable electronics, researchers and looking for a way to get larger amounts of power to these tiny devices. Due to the limited size of these devices, it is difficult to transmit data via the small battery.

Now, MIT researchers have found a way to solve this issue by developing an approach that can deliver short but big bursts of power to small devices. The development has the potential to affect more than wearable electronics through its ability to deliver high power in small volumes to larger-scale applications. The key to this new development is the team’s novel supercapacitor.

This from MIT:

The new approach uses yarns, made from nanowires of the element niobium, as the electrodes in tiny supercapacitors (which are essentially pairs of electrically conducting fibers with an insulator between). In this new work, [Seyed M. Mirvakili] and his colleagues have shown that desirable characteristics for such devices, such as high power density, are not unique to carbon-based nanoparticles, and that niobium nanowire yarn is a promising an alternative.

(more…)

The “designer carbon” improved the supercapacitor’s electrical conductivity threefold compared to electrodes made of conventional activated carbon.
Image: Stanford University

Stanford University researchers have developed a new “designer carbon” that can be fine-tuned for a variety of applications, including energy storage and water filters.

The newly developed carbon material has shown that it can significantly improve the power delivery rate of supercapacitors and boost the performance of energy storage technologies.

“We have developed a ‘designer carbon’ that is both versatile and controllable,” said Zhenan Bao, past member of ECS and the senior author of the study. “Our study shows that this material has exceptional energy-storage capacity, enabling unprecedented performance in lithium-sulfur batteries and supercapacitors.”

(PS: Check out some of Bao’s past papers in the Digital Library!)

Not only is the new carbon an improvement over existing versions, it also has a huge potential scope and is inexpensive to produce.

(more…)

The high-performance 3D microbattery is suitable for large-scale on-chip integration.
Image: Engineering at Illinois

Engineers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s College of Engineering have developed a high-performance 3D microbattery applicable for large-scale on-chip integration with microelectronic devices.

“This 3D microbattery has exceptional performance and scalability, and we think it will be of importance for many applications,” said Paul Braun, professor of materials science and engineering at Illinois.

“Micro-scale devices typically utilize power supplied off-chip because of difficulties in miniaturizing energy storage technologies. A miniaturized high-energy and high-power on-chip battery would be highly desirable for applications including autonomous microscale actuators, distributed wireless sensors and transmitters, monitors, and portable and implantable medical devices.”

(more…)

The hybrid supercapacitor can store large amounts of energy, recharge quickly, and last for more than 10,000 recharge cycles.
Image: UCLA

Researchers from UCLA’s California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI) have developed a new generation of supercapacitors that not only emphasizes the best inherent properties of the supercapacitor itself, but also combines it with some of the best qualities of batteries to make a new energy storage medium.

The new supercapacitor is paper-thin and has an extremely fast recharge time. Additionally, it can last more than 10,000 recharge cycles.

Researchers believe this new development will yield real-world potential to address energy issues and improve personal electronics.

“The microsupercapacitor is a new evolving configuration, a very small rechargeable power source with a much higher capacity than previous lithium thin-film microbatteries,” said Maher El-Kady, co-author of the study and postdoctoral scholar.

(more…)

The researchers are also investigating the textured graphene surfaces for 3D sensor applications.
Image: Nano Letters

The infamous wonder material is becoming even more wonderful with this new development from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC).

Scientist from UIUC have developed a novel process to transform flat graphene from 2D to 3D with a simple and commercially available single-step process. The process uses thermally activated shape-memory polymer substrates to texture the graphene and “crumple” it to give it an increased surface space.

With the easy of this process and the increased surface space of the material, there is a potential for electronics and biomaterials to advance at a much faster rate.

(more…)

The flexible material created at Rice University has the potential for use in electronics or for energy storage.
Image: Tour Group/Rice University

James Tour and his group at Rice University have developed and tested a flexible, three-dimensional supercapacitor with the potential to be scaled up for commercial applications.

In this study, the researchers advanced what they had already developed in laser-induced graphene (LIG) by producing and testing the stacked, three-dimensional supercapacitors.

Their prior findings showed that firing a laser at an inexpensive polymer burned off other elements and left a film of porous graphene, which has the potential to be the perfect electrode for supercapacitors or electronic circuits.

The researchers began by making vertically aligned supercapacitors with laser-induced graphene on both sides of a polymer sheet.

(more…)

The modified graphene aerogels are promising for high-power electrical energy storage applications due to their high surface area and excellent conductivity.
Credit: Ryan Chen

We all know the buzz around graphene, but now researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have found a way to improve upon this ultra-light material to boost the efficiency of your personal electronics.

The team at Lawrence Livermore have turned to graphene aerogel for enhanced electrical energy storage. This new generation of graphene has the potential to smooth power fluctuations in the energy grid, among other things.

(more…)

The battle to produce the most efficient and environmentally friendly car rages on, and now a new company is rising in the ranks by proposing we power our cars with salt water.

The Quant e-Sportlimousine made its debut at the 2014 Geneva Motor Show and showcased its innovative NanoFlowcell technology. This new technology sets itself apart from other systems in its ability to store and release electrical energy at very high densities – all with the help of salt water.

This from Intelligent Living:

The flow cell system powering the Quant e-Sportlimousine’s four electric motors develops electricity from the electrochemical reaction created by two electrolyte solutions. This electricity is forwarded to super capacitors where it’s stored and distributed.

(more…)