Researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have developed the most powerful microbatteries ever. The new microbatteries are more powerful than the best super capacitors. These microbatteries are few millimeters in size, yet they are powerful to start a dead car battery and also to recharge phones in fraction of seconds.
The new microbatteries could drive new applications in radio communications and compact electronics.
"This is a whole new way to think about batteries," said William P. King, the Bliss Professor of mechanical science and engineering, the leader of the new microbatteries research.
"A battery can deliver far more power than anybody ever thought. In recent decades, electronics have gotten small. The thinking parts of computers have gotten small. And the battery has lagged far behind. This is a microtechnology that could change all of that. Now the power source is as high-performance as the rest of it," he added.
Users have to choose between the two available power sources: energy and power.
For applications which need more power, like radio signal broadcasting over a very long distance, capacitors releases energy very quickly but stores only a small amount.
For applications that need lot of energy, such as playing a radio for long time, batteries can hold a lot of energy in it, but releases it slowly.
But, the new microbatteries offers both energy and power, the researchers are working for tuning them over a wide range on the power vs energy scale.
In addition to consumer electronics, lasers, sensors, medical devices and other applications could see a leap forward in technology with such power sources available.
The research team is now working on integrating their microbatteries with other electronics components, as well in reducing the cost of manufacturing. The researchers have published the resuls in the latest issue of Nature Communications.
