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Researchers have finally been able to crack the secret of self-healing battery electrode. Experts believe the invention has the potential to become next-generation lithium ion batteries that can power electric cars, mobile phones and a large number of other battery-powered devices.

Scientists used a stretchy polymer that coats the electrode and binds it. When a crack develops during the operation, these polymers spontaneously heal those tiny cracks.

The research is being carried out by a team of researchers from Stanford University and the Department of Energy’s (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory.

“Self-healing is very important for the survival and long lifetimes of animals and plants,” said Chao Wang in a press release, a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford who is also one of two principal authors of the paper. “We want to incorporate this feature into lithium ion batteries so they will have a long lifetime as well.”

Initially Chao developed the self-healing polymer and for incorporating it in battery project he added tiny nanoparticles of carbon to the polymer. This addition made it even more easier to conduct electricity.

“Their capacity for storing energy is in the practical range now, but we would certainly like to push that,” said Yi Cui, an associate professor at SLAC and Stanford who led the research with Bao in a press release.

In the tests the electrodes worked for about 100 charge-discharge cycles without significantly losing their energy storage capacity.

“That’s still quite a way from the goal of about 500 cycles for cell phones and 3,000 cycles for an electric vehicle,” Cui said, “but the promise is there, and from all our data it looks like it’s working.”

The progress of the study is reported in the Nov 19 issue of Nature Chemistry.