You sure have heard about the Li-Ion batteries (your smartphone might just have one) but have you heard about the Lithium-Air battery? The Li-Air battery stores 4x as much energy per pound as the traditional Li-Ion battery, but the technology hasn't seen rapid development in the recent months. The nature of the electro-chemical reactions that take place in these batteries is not yet clearly understood. However, MIT researchers Robert Mitchell & Betar Gallant have used a transmission electron microscope (TEM) imaging technique to observe the molecular level reactions that happen when the batteries are charged.


The work has been described in Nano Letters paper published by Robert Mitchell. The observations have shown for the first time the the oxidation of Lithium Peroxide, which gets formed during the discharge of the Li-Air battery. What's more interesting is that the rate of oxidation in the experiments conducted by the researchers was 100x faster than the current generation of Li-Air batteries, available mostly in laboratories.

There's no word on whether the technology will ever find commercial applications. Those of you who're interested in knowing more about the research, head over to the source link below.

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