Breathe and Reboot: New Design of Lithium-Ion Battery Recharges Portable Devices in 10 Minutes

Most people in a hurry don't have time to wait hours for their iPhones, iPads or even electric cars to fully charge. But with a new design of lithium-ion batteries, you don't have to; they reboot portable electronics in as little as 10 minutes.

Researchers at the University of California, Riverside Bourns College of Engineering developed a novel structure of 3-D, silicon-decorated, cone-shaped carbon nanotube clusters architecture, according to a press release.

Lithium-ion batteries are the rechargeable battery of choice when it comes to any electronic devices, but their structure and considerable size poses problems. Graphite based lithium-ion battery anodes are what is currently on the market, but silicon material is now taking center stage.

Silicon anodes have the potential to make such rechargeable batteries even smaller and lighter, plus they bring additional upgrades to the table. Replacing the commonly used graphite anode with silicon anodes will potentially result in a 63 percent increase of total cell capacity and a battery that is 40 percent lighter and smaller. Not to mention its total charge capacity is 10 times higher compared to traditional lithium-ion batteries.

The innovative gadget has excellent electrochemical stability and irreversibility, even at high charge and discharge rates - nearly 16 times faster than conventionally used graphite based anodes.

Its ultrafast capabilities, researchers say, can be attributed to the seamless connection between graphene-covered copper foil and carbon nanotubes, and its cone-shaped style.

Developers describe their design in a paper, Silicon Decorated Cone Shaped Carbon Nanotube Clusters for Lithium Ion Battery Anode, recently published in the journal SMALL.