Samsung grant will fund better energy storage systems
WashU’s Sang-Hoon Bae shares grant with MIT to improve electrostatic capacitors
The past few years, researchers at Washington University in St. Louis found a promising way to improve electrostatic capacitors using an innovative design of the ferroelectric materials that maintain electric polarization. The work caught the eye of component manufacturer Samsung Electro-Mechanics, which has awarded an $1.8 million grant to take this technology to the next level.
Capacitors are a key part of how many advanced electronic devices (including smart phones) function, storing energy in an electric field that can be released quickly as opposed the slower releasing chemical energy used in batteries. Capacitors are typically made of two conductive materials with an insulating material in between called the “dielectric,” over which the field will form.
In previous research, Sang Hoon Bae, assistant professor of mechanical engineering & materials science in the McKelvey School of Engineering, and colleagues, demonstrated how they layered ferroelectric materials in a 2D/3D/2D structure only 30 nanometers thick (one-tenth the size of a virus particle). The atomic thin design preserves the crystallinity of the materials and reduces energy loss.
“By minimizing the energy loss, we enhance the energy storage efficiency,” added Bae.
It’s not a subtle improvement: the energy density of the capacitor was improved 19 times over commercially available ferroelectric capacitors, reaching unprecedented energy efficiency of over 90%. Bae and collaborators at MIT will use $1.8 million grant to further optimize this technology over the next few years and could vastly improve the energy storage capacity of electric vehicles and other devices.
