Three researchers have been rewarded for their work in developing the lithium-ion battery
ALTHOUGH ALFRED NOBEL’S will states that the annual prizes bearing his name should be given to those who “have conferred the greatest benefit to mankind”, the science awards have a tendency to end up in the hands of those who have made esoteric, if profound, advances. Not so with this year’s prize in chemistry. Three researchers—two from America and one from Japan—have been rewarded for their work in developing the lithium-ion battery.
Dr Whittingham discovered that when lithium ions intercalated into a substance called titanium disulphide, the interaction between the two stored a useful amount of energy. Using metallic lithium as an anode and titanium disulphide as a cathode, he built a rechargeable battery that worked at room temperature. In it, lithium at the anode is ionised. The ions thus produced then move from the anode, through an intervening electrolyte, and into the spaces in the titanium disulphide cathode.
Akira Yoshino, the third laureate, took Dr Goodenough’s idea and transformed it into the modern battery that sits inside the world’s computers and phones. In the 1980s he was working at the Asahi Kasei Corporation, in Japan, at a moment when electronics companies were becoming increasingly interested in lightweight batteries that could power new electronic devices such as video cameras and cordless telephones.
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