Leading science journal Nature Communications has published an article on a “low-cost, highly energy-efficient” aluminum battery developed by an international research team led by National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU) professor Chen Chia-chun (陳家俊), the university said yesterday.
Chen, a professor of chemistry, said that his team set out to search for an alternative to lithium-ion batteries widely used in mobile devices and electric cars, which he said have become expensive due to increasing demand.
It is a “clear trend” that companies have been seeking other materials to replace lithium when making batteries, he said.
As aluminum is the most ubiquitous element on the planet, an aluminum-ion battery would be remarkably cheaper than lithium-ion ones, he said, adding that the battery is paper-thin, flexible and therefore space-saving.
The aluminum-ion battery also has a longer lifespan, he said.
“Each aluminum atom releases three electrons during the same unit time one electron is released by a lithium atom, making them three times as efficient as lithium-ion batteries,” he said.
The aluminum-ion battery is also more stable than lithium-ion batteries, which are prone to catch fire, and safer than lead-acid batteries, which are toxic, he said.
“Aluminum oxidizes much more slowly than lithium, so even if the battery is cracked and the aluminum comes into contact with oxygen and water, it is less likely to catch fire,” he said.
The battery was jointly developed by Chen, former NTNU assistant professor of chemistry Wang Diyan (王迪彥), Stanford University professor of chemistry Hongjie Dai and National Taiwan University of Science and Technology professor of chemical engineering Hwang Bing Joe (黃炳照) using funds allocated for the Ministry of Education’s “Race to Top Universities” initiative.
The battery has enough output to power mobile devices and, theoretically, electric cars, Chen said.
The team has established a company in San Francisco near the Silicon Valley in a bid to identify niche markets for the product.
The research was published in the Feb. 13 edition of Nature Communications.
OVERHAUL NEEDED: The government should improve its agricultural processing capabilities and expand to new markets to limit its reliance on China, an expert said China’s ban on Taiwanese pineapples was “unsurprising,” and Taiwan should have years ago altered its produce export strategies and target customers, experts said. China on Friday abruptly suspended imports of pineapples from Taiwan, saying that it had on multiple occasions discovered “harmful biological entities” on the fruit. Calling it an “unfriendly” move, the Council of Agriculture (COA) said that 99.79 percent of the pineapples sent to China since last year have met China’s import standards. Chiao Chun (焦鈞), the author of Fruits and Politics — A Recollection of Cross-strait Agricultural Interaction Over the Past Decade (水果政治學：兩岸農業交流十年回顧與展望), said that China’s announcement is clearly targeting
‘NOT COLD ENOUGH’: Schools are disregarding Premier Su Tseng-chang’s instruction that students may wear out-of-uniform clothing to stay warm, an association said An investigative report revealed that 72.5 percent of the nation’s senior-high schools and 95.6 percent of junior-high schools punish students for wearing unapproved winter clothes in contravention of educational guidelines, lawmakers and student rights advocates said yesterday. Speaking at a news conference at the Legislative Yuan, the Taiwan Youth Association for Democracy said there is an endemic disregard for the Ministry of Education’s regulations and that private schools are more likely to contravene ministry rules. The report is a compilation of 2,856 student reports about dress code reinforcement at 425 high schools and vocational high schools, the association said. Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌)
DECADES OF INFLUENCE: Over the past 20 years, China has made inroads with Aborigines, funding political campaigns and trips, a legislator said Lawmakers have called on the National Security Bureau to investigate claims of pervasive Chinese influence among Aboriginal communities. Legislators pointed to a surge in communist propaganda and Chinese-funded projects over the past few years, which they say are aimed at infiltrating and buying political influence among Aboriginal communities. “China has for decades carried out wide-ranging ‘united front’ tactics and propaganda campaigns targeting Aborigines,” said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Ying (陳瑩), a member of the Puyuma community in Taitung County. “Now, they are influencing elections for local councilors and village chiefs, offering money for candidates to mount their campaigns, and to
DISSATISFACTION? If the referendums collect more than 700,000 signatures each, they would have gotten the most signatures in the shortest time, the party said The Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) two referendum petitions — one on banning the importation of pork with traces of ractopamine and the other on holding referendums on the same day as national elections — had as of Thursday gathered 691,398 and 674,497 signatures respectively, the party said yesterday. If the petitions collect more than 700,000 signatures apiece, they would have garnered the most signatures in the shortest time since the Referendum Act (公民投票法) was amended in 2017, party officials said. The KMT proposed the “anti-ractopamine pork” or “food safety” referendum just days after President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) announcement on Aug. 28 last
RSS