A smart safe rechargeable zinc ion battery based on sol-gel transition electrolytes
The thermal runaway issue has been a longstanding obstacle impeding the development of high-energy-density, high-power delivery batteries. These batteries would generate a lot of heat in ultrafast charge/discharge process or hazardous conditions, such as overcharging and short-circuits. To dissipate the heat accumulated in the batteries, physical safety designs such as fused disconnect switches, extinguishing agents, and shutdown current collectors have been employed. However, these approaches only provide one-time protection. There is no provision for these strategies to spontaneously restore the original working condition of batteries once the temperature is cooled down. Therefore, intelligent and active internal safety strategies are required for fabricating smart batteries with dynamic electrochemical performance and self-adaptive response to temperature.