Bio-Engineered Batteries?

It seems Angela Belcher’s lab, Biomolecular Materials Group at MIT, has come up with a new microminiature battery, developed from genetically altered viruses, that could change technology as we know it!

The minute size of this battery has incredible application implications for the powering of electronics, electric cars, and the military.

“We can make them in larger diameters,” Belcher said, “but they are all 880 nanometers in length,” which matches the length of the individual virus particles. And, “once we’ve altered the genes of the virus to grow the electrode material, we can easily clone millions of identical copies of the virus to use in assembling our batteries. For the metal oxide we chose cobalt oxide because it has very good specific capacity, which will produce batteries with high energy density.”

More bang for the buck is what this all measures up to. Just to give you an idea of themicroscopicity of this itty bitty battery, a nanometer is one billionth of a meter (500 times smaller than the tip of your pen). And for you engineers, the anode and electrolyte elements for this battery are a done deal. The cathode has given them some difficulty but there are a few working prototypes in the lab, as we speak.

“The nanoscale materials we’ve made supply two to three times the electrical energy for their mass or volume, compared to previous materials,” the team reported.

These futuristic batteries are so tweaky that they could be interwoven into fabric for military applications (the ultimate in warfighting battle armor). “We definitely don’t have full batteries on those [fiber architectures]. We’ve only worked on single electrodes so far, but the idea is to try to make these fiber batteries that could be integrated into textiles and woven into lots of different shapes,” Belcher says, explaining that much of this is still in the works, but that it is conceivably possible, in the very near future, that people’s clothing, cars, aircraft skins, etc. may be interwoven with finely spun power filaments for every application imaginable.

The size and weight of standard batteries powerful enough to propel electric cars has always been an engineering constraint in design.

The positively-charged anode is created by genetically altering the virus so that it draws to itself the materials it needs to become “the positive terminal” of the battery. “Once you do the genetic engineering with the viruses themselves, you pour in the solution and they grow the right combination of these materials on them,” Belcher says. Basically, the microbes collect exotic materials, primarily cobalt oxide and gold. And because these viruses are negatively charged, they can be sandwiched in between oppositely charged polymers to form thin, flexible sheets or spun from liquid crystal like a spiderweb to series or parallel strings of tiny power producing networks.

“What we’re working on is not thinking about a particular device application, but trying to improve the quality of the anode and cathode materials—using biology just to make a higher quality material for energy density,” Belcher says. “We haven’t ruled out cars. That’s a lot of amplification. But right now the thing is trying to make the best material possible, and if we get a really great material, then we have to think about how do you scale it.”

This research was funded by the Army Research Office Institute of Collaborative Biotechnologies, the Institute of Soldier Nanotechnologies and the David and Lucille Packard Foundation.

Uqm Technologies and Phoenix Motorcars to Develop Plug-in Sut

The quest to develop the best solution to greenhouse gas emission and fuel consumption reduction has lead to partnerships between companies within the auto industry and among other industries as well. Car manufacturers even teamed up with the U.S. government to develop vehicles which not only consumes less or no fuel but also reduces or eliminates the emission of greenhouse gases.

Recently, another partnership has been forged with the aim of developing a vehicle that will be promoted as a solution to the increasing price of gasoline and the threat of global warming. UQM Technologies, one of the leading manufacturers of electric motors, and Phoenix Motorcars, a manufacturer of battery powered vehicles, have joined forces so as to create a plug-in hybrid sport utility truck.

Hybrid technology is currently very popular in the United States. The hybrid revolution started when Toyota unleashed the Prius in the U.S. auto market some years back. A typical hybrid electric vehicle is equipped with an internal combustion engine and an electric motor providing extra power. These vehicles, given the internal combustion engine, are not as limited as pure electric cars. But what the partnership aims to develop is a plug-in electric hybrid sport utility truck. That means that the battery pack powering the vehicle will not only derive its charge from the engine or from the energy captured during braking but also from the power grid.

A plug-in hybrid vehicle’s battery pack can be recharged from an ordinary household socket. This means that while the vehicle is parked in one’s garage, the owner can recharge the vehicle by simply plugging it in into an ordinary socket just like what you would do to give a mobile gadget some juice.

The plan for the plug-in electric hybrid vehicle is to provide it with a battery pack which can power it without the aid of the internal combustion engine for 20 to 60 miles. If the partnership achieves this feat and the cost of production be lowered so that it can be available to more people, millions of American motorists will not need to consume a drop of gasoline for their everyday driving. A study reveals that the average American drives 25 miles per day or less.

The plug-in electric hybrid will be a five-passenger dual cab pickup truck. The Phoenix Sport Utility Truck will be 194 inches in length and will have a wheelbase measuring 108 inches. The vehicle will have respectable towing capacity for its nature with a half a ton payload capacity. A small internal combustion engine will be employed by the pickup truck powered by gasoline. The plug-in hybrid SUT will use NanoSafe® lithium titanate batteries provided by Altair Nanotechnologies, Inc. Other components like the brakes, transmission, and other related parts will be provided by other manufacturers.

Dan Elliot, the president and the chief executive officer of Phoenix Motorcars, has this to say: “The development of a plug-in hybrid model of our sport utility truck is an important expansion of our model offering that we expect will meet the needs of a broader range of customers. Plug-in hybrids offer the opportunity to operate the vehicle in the most common driving environments in all-electric mode, saving money and reducing emissions, while maintaining the flexibility to travel cross-country. We believe a potentially large market will develop for this category of vehicle and we intend to develop a high performing vehicle that our customers can be excited to own and drive.”

Meanwhile, William G. Rankin, the president and the chief executive officer of UQM Technologies, has this to say: “We are excited about the opportunity to collaborate with Phoenix Motorcars on this exciting new development. Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles present us with a tremendous opportunity to achieve broader market share for our propulsion systems and electronics. We are looking forward to participating in the development and launch of another exciting Phoenix model with our other strategic partners, Boshart Engineering and Altair Nanotechnologies,”

No More Exploding Laptop Batteries?

Aww darn, no more cool explosions from exploding laptop batteries!  STOBA, a new material technology will steal the joy of seeing your laptop explode from faulty batteries. Boy, it seemed like a week didn’t pass without Apple, Toshiba laptop battery, Sony, Dell laptop battery, Sanyo, Lenovo, or some other laptop manufacturer issuing a battery recall due to exploding batteries. Well, apparently STOBA will make consumer electronics safer.

Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) has developed STOBA, a material technology that prevents lithium-ion batteries from overheating, catching fire or exploding.

Check out a video of how the technology works, including a demonstration on why lithium-ion batteries explode. There is an animated explosion in the demo, so enjoy.

ITRI’s STOBA material technology for Lithium-ion batteries has received a 2009 R&D 100 Award.

Innovative Technology is First to Ensure the Safety of Lithium-ion Batteries
Used in Many Consumer Electronics and Electric Vehicles

HSINCHU, Taiwan, Nov. 12, 2009 – ITRI (Industrial Technology Research Institute), Taiwan’s largest and one of the world’s leading high-tech research and development institutions, will accept a “2009 R&D 100 Award in Energy Devices” today, in Orlando, Fla., for developing STOBA (self-terminated oligomers with hyper-branched architecture), the first technology to enhance the safety of lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries.

“It is a great honor to be recognized by a publication as prestigious and influential as R&D Magazine,” said Dr. Alex Peng, senior research scientist and deputy general director at ITRI’s Material and Chemical Research Laboratories (MCL). “During the past five years, the STOBA team worked diligently to develop this technology. They have truly earned this achievement.” 

Li-ion batteries, the power source for many consumer electronic devices, including cell phones, laptops, MP3 players, cameras, and hybrid and electric cars, are susceptible to overheating, which can cause fires and explosions. In the past, safety standards for Li-ion batteries could not be raised because there was no solution available.

To meet the growing demand for high-safety lithium batteries, ITRI successfully developed STOBA, which has fundamentally resolved the safety issue. By integrating a nano-grade high-molecular polymer, which forms a protective film, into the Li-ion battery, a locking effect is generated when the battery encounters excessive heat, external impact or piercing and interrupts the electrical and chemical action, preventing explosions. In 2008 and 2009, STOBA passed the mandatory shorting and piercing experiments conducted by battery manufacturers in Japan and Taiwan. These intensive nail penetration and impact tests confirmed STOBA’s effectiveness in preventing internal shorting and overheating in Li-ion batteries.

For the past 47 years, The R&D 100 Awards have annually identified and recognized the 100 most significant and revolutionary technologies newly introduced to the market. Past winning technologies include the printer (1986) and HDTV (1998). An R&D 100 Award serves as a mark of excellence to industry, government and academia and confirms the technology is one of the top innovations of the year. This year’s winners will be honored at a ceremony this evening in Orlando, Fla.

The Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) is a nonprofit R&D organization engaging in applied research and technical services. Founded in 1973, ITRI has played a vital role in transforming Taiwan’s economy from a labor-intensive industry to a high-tech industry. Numerous well-known high-tech companies in Taiwan, such as leaders in the semiconductor industry TSMC and UMC, can trace their origins to ITRI.

Innovative Research
ITRI is a multidisciplinary research center, with six core laboratories, five focus centers, five linkage centers, several leading labs and various business development units. The six fields ITRI focuses on include Information and Communication; Electronics and Optoelectronics; Material, Chemical and Nanotechnologies; Biomedical Technologies; Advanced Manufacturing and Systems; and Energy and Environment. ITRI has aggressively researched and developed countless next-generation technologies, including WIMAX wireless broadband, solar cells, RFID, light electric vehicles, flexible displays, 3-D ICs and telecare technologies. In addition, ITRI’s Flexible Electronics Pilot Lab and Nanotechnology Lab provide international-level research platforms where R&D can be conducted jointly with partners. ITRI has also seen significant growth in intellectual property business and new ventures in recent years and is devoted to creating a model that would make Taiwan manufacturing even more competitive in the international arena.

Fostering Entrepreneurship and CEO Leadership
ITRI employs 5,800 personnel, including 1,112 who hold Ph.D.s and 3,206 with master’s degrees, resulting in an average of five patents produced every day. By disseminating both technology and talent, ITRI has led the technology industry into the 21st century and has cultivated 70 CEOs in the local high-tech industry. In addition to its headquarters in Taiwan, ITRI has branch offices in the California Silicon Valley, Tokyo, Berlin and Moscow.

New Electric Cars Are Better

Just showing off some of the cool new electric cars and putting to rest some of the myths out there. When people think of electric cars, typically they think of older ugly slower models, lead-acid batterys, and BS propaganda they’ve read slamming the “electric cars”(as though they all carried the exact same attributes) The battery technology has changed(and will change even more when nanowire battery becomes common), the speeds have changed, the climate versatility has changed, the prices are changing, the car companies are changing… everything is changing for the better. I expect to see a lot more support for ev’s during and after 2010.