Fully Integrated Design of a Stretchable Solid‐State Lithium-Ion Full Battery
A solid‐state lithium‐ion battery, in which all components (current collector, anode and cathode, electrolyte, and packaging) are stretchable, is being developed by researcher of the Laboratory for Multifunctional Materials group, giving rise to a battery design with mechanical properties that are compliant with flexible electronic devices and elastic wearable systems.
Today’s electronics industry is increasingly focusing on computers or smartphones with screens that can be folded or rolled. Smart clothing items make use of wearable micro-devices or sensors to monitor bodily functions, for example. However, all these devices need an energy source, which is usually a lithium-ion battery. Unfortunately, commercial batteries are typically heavy and rigid, making it fundamentally unsuitable for applications in flexible electronics or textiles.
A remedy for this problem is now being created by Markus Niederberger, Professor for Multifunctional Materials at ETH Zurich, and his team. The researchers have developed a prototype for a flexible thin-film battery that can be bent, stretched and even twisted without interrupting the supply of power.
- ETH News: English, German
- Chen X, Huang H, Pan L, Liu T, Niederberger M. Fully Integrated Design of a Stretchable Solid‐State Lithium‐Ion Full Battery. Adv.Mater.2019, first published: 06 September 2019. external pageDOI:10.1002/adma.201904648
- Laboratory for Multifunctional Materials