BBC:
Reducing battery size and recharge time are two of the goals of
current research. William King of the University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign and his colleagues believe their new electrode
design succeeds on both counts. They created a lattice of
polystyrene spheres and then filled the spaces around the
spheres with metal. After dissolving the spheres, they plated
the metal framework with a nickelâtin alloy to
create the anode, and with manganese oxyhydroxide to create the
cathode. They alternated several anodes and cathodes on a glass
surface and then enclosed them and filled the device with an
electrolyte. The lattice structure of the electrodes
significantly increases the battery's surface area while
keeping its volume extremely small. The result is a battery
just as powerful as a traditional battery, but at 1/10th the
size. The increased surface area also allows the new battery to
recharge 1000 times faster. Several issues need to be addressed
before the new design is ready for commercial development,
however, including simplifying the fabrication process and
replacing the highly combustible electrolyte with a safer,
polymer-based one.
