#Silk could be new'green'material for next-generation batteries Lithium-ion batteries have enabled many of today electronics, from portable gadgets to electric cars. But much to the frustration of consumers, none of these batteries last long without a recharge. Now scientists report in the journal ACS Nano("Hierarchical Porous Nitrogen-Doped Carbon Nanosheets Derived from Silk for Ultrahigh-Capacity Battery Anodes and Supercapacitors")the development of a new, reenway to boost the performance of these batteries with a material derived from silk. Chuanbao Cao and colleagues note that carbon is a key component in commercial Li-ion energy storage devices including batteries and supercapacitors. Most commonly graphite fills that role, but it has limited a energy capacity. To improve the energy storage, manufacturers are looking for an alternative material to replace graphite. Cao team wanted to see if they could develop such a material using a sustainable source. The researchers found a way to process natural silk to create carbon-based nanosheets that could potentially be used in energy storage devices. Their material stores five times more lithium than graphite can a capacity that is critical to improving battery performance. It also worked for over 10,000 cycles with only a 9 percent loss in stability. The researchers successfully incorporated their material in prototype batteries and supercapacitors in a one-step method that could easily be scaled up, the researchers note h
Overtext Web Module V3.0 Alpha
Copyright Semantic-Knowledge, 1994-2011