Electronics

Nanodot-based smartphone battery that recharges in 30 seconds

Nanodot-based smartphone battery that recharges in 30 seconds
Israeli startup StoreDot has showcased a prototype of a new smartphone battery that can reportedly recharge in just under 30 seconds (Photo: StoreDot)
Israeli startup StoreDot has showcased a prototype of a new smartphone battery that can reportedly recharge in just under 30 seconds (Photo: StoreDot)
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StoreDot's prototype smartphone battery can reportedly fully recharge in under 30 seconds (Photo: StoreDot)
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StoreDot's prototype smartphone battery can reportedly fully recharge in under 30 seconds (Photo: StoreDot)
The battery employs chemically synthesized molecules dubbed "nanodots" (Photo: StoreDot)
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The battery employs chemically synthesized molecules dubbed "nanodots" (Photo: StoreDot)
The company says the nanodots are inexpensive and environmentally friendly (Photo: StoreDot)
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The company says the nanodots are inexpensive and environmentally friendly (Photo: StoreDot)
The battery technology might have potential for electric cars (Photo: StoreDot)
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The battery technology might have potential for electric cars (Photo: StoreDot)
The capacity of the prototype battery is of about 2000 mAh, about the same as a standard smartphone battery (Photo: StoreDot)
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The capacity of the prototype battery is of about 2000 mAh, about the same as a standard smartphone battery (Photo: StoreDot)
The technology is slated to reach mass production by late 2016 (Photo: StoreDot)
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The technology is slated to reach mass production by late 2016 (Photo: StoreDot)
Israeli startup StoreDot has showcased a prototype of a new smartphone battery that can reportedly recharge in just under 30 seconds (Photo: StoreDot)
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Israeli startup StoreDot has showcased a prototype of a new smartphone battery that can reportedly recharge in just under 30 seconds (Photo: StoreDot)
View gallery - 7 images

Today at Microsoft’s Think Next symposium in Tel Aviv, Israeli startup StoreDot has demonstrated the prototype of a nanodot-based smartphone battery it claims can fully charge in just under 30 seconds. With the company having plans for mass production, this technology could change the way we interact with portable electronics, and perhaps even help realize the dream of a fast-charging electric car.

As we all know only too well, recharging our portable electronics can take a painfully long time. This is because reversing the chemical reactions that caused the battery to deplete is a process that can hardly be rushed, for considerations of both safety and energy efficiency.

But now, a radically new battery design advanced by StoreDot could bring charge times down to the order of a few seconds. The company produces so-called nanodots, chemically synthesized bio-organic peptide molecules that, thanks to their small size, improve electrode capacitance and electrolyte performance. The end result is batteries that can be fully charged in seconds rather than hours.

'In essence, we have developed a new generation of electrodes with new materials – we call it MFE – Multi Function Electrode," StoreDot CEO Doron Myersdorf told Gizmag. "On one side it acts like a supercapacitor (with very fast charging), and on the other is like a lithium electrode (with slow discharge). The electrolyte is modified with our nanodots in order to make the multifunction electrode more effective."

The company says that unlike other nanodot and quantum-dot technologies that are heavy metal based, making them toxic, its nanodots are made from a vast range of bio-organic raw materials that are environmentally-friendly. These materials are also naturally abundant, and the nanodots employ a basic biological mechanism of self-assembly, making them cheap to manufacture.

Self-discharge characteristics are similar to those of lithium-ion cells and, for its first prototype, the company targeted the approximate capacity of a smartphone battery (around 2,000 mAh).

But Myersdorf told us that the technology could also be adapted to electric cars, by modifying the electrode so it could sustain higher currents (and, of course, configuring a large number of cells in parallel).

StoreDot is in the process of submitting patents for the technology, and mass production of the smartphone batteries is planned for late 2016.

The video below illustrates just how quickly the battery can be recharged.

Source: StoreDot

Charging Smartphone in 30S: StoreDot Flash-Battery Demo

View gallery - 7 images
25 comments
25 comments
BigGoofyGuy
I think this has a wide range of uses and a lot of potential. It would make hybrids use electric power more than the gas engine. It would be a boost for anything that is battery powered.
livin_the_dream
This huge, woohoo if they can make large units for storing solar energy cheaply and cleanly. I'll hold off bying my electric car for a couple of years until this avail!
Rehab
Need this sooner rather than later, shut down big polluters like the tar sands and coal generating stations ......... yes!
iperov
nice fake app. How about real voltmeter data?
Dziks
@Rehab - you cannot just shut down whatever you want. Thousands of people would end up on a street... The change process will take decades, unfortunately. Maybe in 3 generations people will look at the coal power plants or combustion engines like on relicts but nothing will change during one night.
DLaw
Hmmm.... I'm a bit surprised. Unless this technology just all of a sudden appeared out of nowhere, then why would Elon Musk propose a $5 billion Lithium based battery factory? He must be aware of this technology. My thoughts are that Musk's engineer's looked at it but it was many years off before it could be used for automobiles. That said.. it is still a "game changer". Lets cross our fingers and hope this technology can pack a lot of energy and also recharge quickly.
LordInsidious
This could be one more nail in the 'lets burn stuff to make power' mentality and it's made from organic materials, awesome!
Dragon_Elder
@Rehab, Sadly this will do nothing to shut down existing power generation as you still have to get the energy from somewhere to charge these new batteries. Moving to electric cars just changes where the pollution is generated and ideally since large generation plants can be more efficient then individual cars reducing that pollution. Solar would be great but it's efficiency and cost of investment still doesn't it make it a viable replacement for other fuels yet.
txt295
Yes, as Dragon_Elder explains write, it won't change anything on the energy consumption. Whether you need 2 hours or 30 seconds to charge an accu, it still takes practically the same amount of energy.
The parameters of SoreDot sound promising, but I remain skeptical. The description tells nothing about the technology, they just put together all latest fashion words like nanotechnology, nanodots, bio, organic, supercapacitor, cheap, abundant,... without any explanation on the way it is supposed to improve the electrodes and electrolyte. I hope I am wrong, but it sounds more like an investor scam than anything else.
Beside it, if the accu of 2,000 mAh is supposed to be as big as the prototype on their video (about ten times the volume of the phone), then it would not be better than current supercapacitors already are (unless it is much cheaper and simpler to manufacture).
Fretting Freddy the Ferret pressing the Fret
Now what does it cost, $/kWh? I like the renewable aspect of it. We will soon see more novel battery concepts being developed and hopefully, commercialized. Let us see how those compares to this and older battery technologies.
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