Lithium-ion battery research at SGM

 Energy storage technologies, including better batteries, are critical to ensuring reliable power from intermittent renewable sources like wind and solar. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers are using our SGM beamline to improve the rechargeability of lithium-oxygen batteries, which could theoretically hold three times as much energy than current commercial rechargeables.

MIT doctorate students Graham Leverick and Yirui Zhang prepare samples for analysis using X-ray Absorption Spectroscopy (XAS).

SGM Support Scientist Zachary Arthur and Graham Leverick discussing the best way to load samples into the beamline for an experiment that will hopefully help understand the charge and discharge process in lithium oxygen batteries.

Graham Leverick and Yirui Zhang on SGM. Lithium ions in lithium oxygen batteries react with oxygen to form lithium peroxide, an insulator, when the battery is used. This presents special difficulties in the charge process, which the team hopes to better understand.

This work first appeared as a Facebook post for the Canadian Light Source.