By IANS,
Washington : A new device that takes only seconds to recharge mobile phone or laptop batteries is being designed and is expected to hit the markets in two or three years.
The MIT breakthrough could also permit an electric car to be recharged as quickly as it takes to refill a car tank with petrol thus eliminating a virtually insurmountable hurdle to green, clean motoring.
Although lithium ion batteries used in mobile phones, laptops and cameras store a large amount of energy in a small space, they are also slower at recharging – which can be a nuisance for anyone who forgets to charge up overnight.
When a lithium battery is being recharged, positively charged atoms or ions flow from the lithium electrode to the carbon one. When a battery is discharging, the ions flow the other way. But the process of recharging or discharging them is time consuming, said an MIT release.
MIT researcher Gerbrand Cedar, the brain behind the new battery, and his associates have now found a way of speeding up this process. Cedar said their battery relies on readily available materials and would be easy to mass produce.
These findings were reported in Nature.