PEERING INTO A BATTERY

Abstract

A TINY LITHIUM-ION rechargeable battery built inside a transmission electron microscope shows for the first time how a SnO 2 nanowire electrode swells and distorts as it is charged, researchers report in Science (DOI: 10.1126/science.1195628). The open-cell battery uses an ionic liquid electrolyte with a low vapor pressure to resist evaporation under vacuum in the microscope. Calling the experiment “ingenious,” Yet-Ming Chiang, a professor of materials science and engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says in a commentary accompanying the paper that a better understanding of how SnO 2 accommodates the strain of charging “should contribute to the design of nanoscale electrodes that fully exploit the potential of ultrahigh-capacity storage materials.” A crystalline SnO 2 nanowire made up the battery anode in the study, with bulk LiCoO 2 serving as the cathode. Researchers from Sandia and Pacific Northwest National Labs, the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Pennsylvania, and China’...