Promising Lithium Batteries For Electric Cars
Thursday, August 7, 2008 - 07:21
in Physics & Chemistry
Why does lithium iron phosphate, a candidate for use in future lithium batteries, conduct electricity despite being an insulating material? Chemists have shed light on this paradox. Their experimentally verified "domino-cascade model" shows that local stresses within the material allow electrical and ionic conduction to spread from one area to the next, making the battery function. These results open new horizons in the search for improved battery electrode materials and help explain how tomorrow's electric car batteries work.