Researchers get most comprehensive view yet of lithium-ion battery electrode damage

athode degradation: Researchers have created a new technique that scans thousands of particles in the electrode of a battery at once. The goal is to understand how cracks in these particles impact battery performance, so industry can build more reliable batteries with higher charging capacity. (European Synchrotron Radiation Facility image/Yang Yang)
Jun 3 2019
SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
Research
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A multi-institute team of researchers created a new technique for probing the chemistry of battery samples and creating images in near-atomic detail to understand how electrode damage reduces a battery's charging capacity. Using X-ray facilities at the European Synchrotron Radiation facility (ESRF) and SLAC's Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource (SSRL), researchers scanned as many electrode particles as possible in a single round and produced X-ray images for analysis.