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A team of researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have discovered a new way to store electrical energy and a paper on their research was published this week in Nature.

Gerbrand Ceder, an R. P. Simmons Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, and his team at MIT’s Computational and Experimental Design of Emerging Materials Research group have found a way to demonstrate how batteries, which obtain high energy density by storing a charge in the bulk of a material, can also reach super-high discharge rates.

What they have developed are battery cells that charge up in seconds. The rates are similar to those of supercapacitors, which are similar to regular capacitors with the exception that they offers a very high charge in a small package.

Technological Breakthrough

Nearly five years ago, Ceder and colleagues made a surprising discovery. Computer calculations of a well-known battery material, lithium iron phosphate, predicted that the material’s lithium ions should actually be moving extremely quickly.

The researchers, whose work was supported by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy, began experimenting with how lithium ions move in and around lithium iron phosphate, a material used in lithium-ion batteries. Through computer calculation of lithium iron phosphate, the researchers predicted the material’s lithium ions would move more quickly from one area to another.

Their discovery of a way to charge and discharge batteries in seconds instead of hours may lead to new technology applications, according to Ceder and MIT graduate student Byoungboo Kang.

Storage of electrical energy at a high charge and discharge rate is significant for several technologies and could change the landscape of batteries produced for laptops and other technological devices. One technology that would benefit, but with limitations, is green technology. The high charge and discharge rate will enable hybrid and plug-in hybrid-electric vehicles and…

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