[h=1]Researchers 3D Print Miniscule On-Chip Microbatteries with Incredible Potential[/h] by Heidi Milkert · May 16, 2015
We are living in an incredibly shrinking world — a world in which we see electronics decrease in size at an almost unbelievable rate. Think about the size of computer memory, music players, and cell phones. Each and every year, the size of microchips get smaller, while their capacities and abilities continue to increase. One area which researchers have been trying to innovate upon, with not all that much success, is in the production of batteries. Battery sizes have not been keeping up with the decreasing size of other electronics, thus creating some perplexing issues for electronic manufacturers and engineers.
This may all be about to change though, thanks to researchers at at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The research team, consisting of Hailong Ning, James H. Pikul, Runyu Zhang, Xuejiao Li, Sheng Xu, Junjie Wang, John A. Rogers, William P. King, and Paul V. Braun have discovered a way of 3D printing lithium-ion microbatteries which can actually be placed directly onto small chips.
The process is one which combines 3D holographic lithography with the more conventional 2D photolithography (a process similar to methods used to make printed circuit boards) to create mesostructured electrodes. All of the details of this research have been published in a paper titled “Holographic Patterning of High Performance on-chip 3D Lithium-ion Microbatteries,” appearing in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Illustrations / images of 3D microbatteries enabled by combining 3D holographic and conventional photolithographies.
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We are living in an incredibly shrinking world — a world in which we see electronics decrease in size at an almost unbelievable rate. Think about the size of computer memory, music players, and cell phones. Each and every year, the size of microchips get smaller, while their capacities and abilities continue to increase. One area which researchers have been trying to innovate upon, with not all that much success, is in the production of batteries. Battery sizes have not been keeping up with the decreasing size of other electronics, thus creating some perplexing issues for electronic manufacturers and engineers.This may all be about to change though, thanks to researchers at at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The research team, consisting of Hailong Ning, James H. Pikul, Runyu Zhang, Xuejiao Li, Sheng Xu, Junjie Wang, John A. Rogers, William P. King, and Paul V. Braun have discovered a way of 3D printing lithium-ion microbatteries which can actually be placed directly onto small chips.
The process is one which combines 3D holographic lithography with the more conventional 2D photolithography (a process similar to methods used to make printed circuit boards) to create mesostructured electrodes. All of the details of this research have been published in a paper titled “Holographic Patterning of High Performance on-chip 3D Lithium-ion Microbatteries,” appearing in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Illustrations / images of 3D microbatteries enabled by combining 3D holographic and conventional photolithographies.“Due to the complexity of 3D electrodes, it is generally difficult to realize such batteries, let alone the possibility of on-chip integration and scaling,” explained Hailong Ning, a MatSE graduate student and first author of the article. “In this project, we developed an effective method to make high-performance 3D lithium-ion microbatteries using processes that are highly compatible with the fabrication of microelectronics. We utilized 3D holographic lithography to define the interior structure of electrodes and 2D photolithography to create the desired electrode shape. This work merges important concepts in fabrication, characterization, and modeling, showing that the energy and power of the microbattery are strongly related to the structural parameters of the electrodes such as size, shape, surface area, porosity, and tortuosity.”
Researchers 3D Print Miniscule On-Chip Microbatteries with Incredible Potential - 3DPrint.com
Researchers 3D Print Miniscule On-Chip Microbatteries with Incredible Potential - 3DPrint.com
