Energy Storage
Soluble lead flow battery
Flow batteries are promising for stationary energy storage for future power grid. A soluble lead flow battery is membrane-less and advantageous in its simple structure and low cost.
We are working on extending the cycle life, increasing the capacity and output power of this system via materials innovation and system engineering.
Lithium Sulfur Battery
Lithium sulfur (Li-S) battery is the next generation Li-ion battery because of its potentially much higher energy density, and abundant natural resources. Experimentally, we aim to reduce the shuttle effects with CNT and bio-materials. A parameter free model for Li-S battery starting from ab-initio calculation to continuum scale is under development.
Lithium-metal battery
Lithiium-metal battery is the Holy Grail of battery technology because its theoretical capacity is over 10 times of the state-of-the-art Li-ion batteries. However, dendrite formation during charge/discharge could lead to explosion and other safety issues. In-situ investigation of dendrite formation is conducted in our group to rationalize the underlying physics. Ultimately, we aim to find a solution to enable Li-metal battery technology.
Supercapacitor
A supercapacitor is advantageous in fast rate charge/discharge as an energy storage device. A hybrid system comprised of a super capacitor and a battery can potentially solve the issue of slow charging rate associated with electric vehicles (EVs.) Here, we focus on using carbon fiber (CF) to make high mechanical strength and high performance super capacitors for EV applications.