Interessant vooral ook omdat het mogelijkheden lijkt te scheppen voor de productie van betere en efficiëntere batterijen. De verbeteringen zouden zitten in:
1. Meer energie-opslag per volume
2. Minder energieverlies voor het laden van de batterijen
3. Kortere oplaadtijd (= snellere energie-overdracht)
Zie bijvoorbeeld:
Carbon nanotubes as energy source?
Battery can charge itself, thanks to nanotech hackScientists of the Massachusetts Institute of technology have discovered a hitherto unknown phenomenon on the basis of which is carbon nanotubes use could make in the future as an energy source. The specific energy (i.e. the energy per unit mass) to be about 100 times higher than for Li-ion batteries.
Inventions Thomas Edison Would Love: Storage BatteriesA lithium-ion battery has been hacked to charge itself when it is flexed or compressed, a breakthrough that could lead to a class of small, portable electronics that stay charged without ever being plugged in.
To do it, researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology removed the barrier that normally separates the two electrodes in a lithium-ion battery and replaced it with a nanotube film with piezoelectric properties.
Piezoelectric devices typically convert movement into electricity such as this electricity-generating backpack. In a totally separate second step, that electricity can then be converted into chemical energy, which is what happens when you charge a battery.
By placing the material between the battery electrodes, the mechanical energy is converted directly to chemical energy, completely bypassing the need to generate electricity at all.
Natuurlijk moet je ook kijken naar eventuele milieuschade-effecten:At Stanford University, scientists are taking Thomas Edison’s venerable old nickel-iron storage battery and turbo-boosting it, increasing its charging/discharging rate almost 1,000 times. All this means if you use these batteries for powering electric vehicles, you can fully charge the battery in about 2 minutes….not hours as required by conventional batteries. This technology could also make it possible to use such batteries as storage on the electrical grid.
The secret sauce here is nanotechnology, and while the new batteries are small and experimental, they should scale up nicely. Nickel, iron and carbon nanotubes, the main constituents of the battery along with a potassium hydroxide electrolyte makes this battery a potentially cheap system.
Carbon nanotubes found to be toxic to aquatic animals
Zoveel mogelijk gescheiden houden van levende wezens dus, lijkt mij.Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are some of the strongest materials on Earth and are used to strengthen composite materials, such as those used in high-performance tennis rackets. CNTs have potential uses in everything from medicine to electronics to construction. However, CNTs are not without risks. A joint study by the University of Missouri and United States Geological Survey found that they can be toxic to aquatic animals. The researchers urge that care be taken to prevent the release of CNTs into the environment as the materials enter mass production.
"The great promise of carbon nanotubes must be balanced with caution and preparation," said Baolin Deng, professor and chair of chemical engineering at the University of Missouri. "We don't know enough about their effects on the environment and human health. The EPA and other regulatory groups need more studies like ours to provide information on the safety of CNTs."