The Idea:
The idea professors at MIT came up with is how they can increase the capacity and durability of batteries. The solution they found isn’t within the ground but inside the human body.
Growing wires :
They decided to use viruses to build a lithium-based wire to replace one of the electrodes in a car battery. Their approach is to increase the surface area of these wires and increase the electrochemical activity, thus increasing the amount of electrical charge it can hold. They use bacteriophages, a type of virus, to form nanowires. These phages will attach themselves to the wire and capture molecules of magnesium oxide. When the phages are grown onto the wire, they form a “spike” making them the perfect building material for the batteries, as these spikes give more surface area for chemical reactions. The final step in this process is to incorporate palladium into the spikes, greatly increasing the amount of energy the wire can handle.
The benefits to these wires are not only an increase in electrochemical reaction but are also more eco-friendly as they can be produced under room temperature and the solution is water based. The inclusion of palladium and bacteriophages significantly decreases the costs of making these batteries.
Inspiration from nature:
This technique is inspired by the Abalone shell, as their DNA enables them to produce proteins that are used to extract calcium molecules used to construct their shell. The perfect host for these manipulations as all they need to do is code their DNA to do a specific task, and the virus should work similarly to the Albone proteins. Additionally, they can infect bacteria and create millions of these worker viruses. Professor Jie Xiao is looking towards also modifying the cathode, if finished successfully it can go into commercial testing, and potentially help improve the environmental impact of lithium batteries.
References
Oberhaus, D. (2020, February 26). The next generation of batteries could be built by viruses. Wired. https://www.wired.com/story/the-next-generation-of-batteries-could-be-built-by-viruses/
New materials could enable longer-lasting implantable batteries | MIT Department of Mechanical Engineering. (n.d.). https://meche.mit.edu/news-media/new-materials-could-enable-longer-lasting-implantable-batteries
Yorumlar