Battery Research and Applications
The 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to John Goodenough, M. Stanley Whittingham, and Akira Yoshino “for the development of lithium-ion batteries.” Read more about battery research and applications in this Collection of stories from the Physics archive.
![](http://cdn.journals.aps.org/test/a5c9acec-9d17-490f-9d0a-110a8d192a98/QMChargingCrop.png)
Speeding Up Battery Charging with Quantum Physics
In a 2017 study of nanoscale batteries with quantized energy states, researchers predicted that coupling the batteries together quantum mechanically would allow them to be charged faster.
https://physics.aps.org/synopsis-for/10.1103/PhysRevLett.118.150601
![](http://cdn.journals.aps.org/test/b31fa2f2-2942-41b0-9055-aca1458ccb46/RelativityCrop.png)
![](http://cdn.journals.aps.org/test/864d91ca-5249-40fe-8f3f-c1194455982b/ClustersCrop.png)
A New Model for Electrolyte Conductivity
A 2019 model provided a new way to calculate the conductivity of electrolytes with a very high concentration of ions. The approach could help to more efficiently screen electrolyte materials for batteries.
https://physics.aps.org/synopsis-for/10.1103/PhysRevLett.122.136001
![](http://cdn.journals.aps.org/test/f663b7e2-7978-43d1-b104-7294fcf9956b/wirelesschargingcrop.png)
![](http://cdn.journals.aps.org/test/ab582ea5-1cfc-4458-a67d-9fef207704b7/PolaronsCrop.png)
![](http://cdn.journals.aps.org/test/2a1fabe5-f8f7-4b4f-a725-bea0785411f9/polymercrop.png)
![](http://cdn.journals.aps.org/test/0dc62d11-7d78-4a62-9acc-b90868bf1611/defectscrop.png)
Defects Step Aside to Let Battery Current Flow
In 2011, researchers explained how a then novel type of rechargeable battery is able to bundle together defects so that they don’t block the flow of ions between electrodes.
https://physics.aps.org/synopsis-for/10.1103/PhysRevLett.107.085507