In their tests they use a few unusual electrode materials, such as a chrome oxide (CR8O21) and an organic polymer (a sulphurized polyacrylonitrile). Both have significant weight benefits compared to the typical materials used in today's batteries, although the resulting batteries usually took less than 500 cycles before they fell to 80 percent of their original capacity.
But the striking experiment came when they used Liso2CF3 To rejuvenate a battery that was made as normal but had lost the capacity due to heavy use. Treatment of a lithium iron phosphate battery that had lost 15 percent of its original capacity, almost everything that was lost, which could keep it more than 99 percent of its original charge. They also ran a battery for repeated cycles with rejuvenation every few thousand cycles. At only 12,000 cycles it can still be restored to 96 percent of its original capacity.
Before you get too excited, there are a few things that are worth it to notice about lithium-iron phosphate cells. The first is that, compared to their load capacity, they are a bit heavy, so they are usually used in large stationary batteries such as those in storage on grid -scale. They are also a long life in themselves; With careful management, they can take more than 8,000 cycles before they fall to 80 percent of their initial capacity. It is not clear whether similar rejuvenation is possible in the battery chemistry that is usually used for the type of devices that most of us possess.
The ultimate caution is that the battery must be changed, so that fresh electrolytes can be pumped and the gases that are released by the demolition of the Liso2CF3 DELETED. It is the safest if this type of access is built into the battery from the start, instead of foreseen by changing it much later, as it was done here. And the required pipes would place a small dent in the capacity of the battery per volume if so.
All of this said, the treatment shown here would even supplement a well -managed battery closer to its original capacity. And it would largely restore the capacity of something that was not carefully managed. And that would enable us to get much more out of the initial costs of the production of batteries. This means that it makes sense for batteries intended for a large storage facility, where many of them can be treated at the same time.
Nature, 2025. DOI: 10.1038/S41586-024-08465-Y (approximately Dois).
