Researchers Develop a Lithium Battery That Won’t Explode

Battery is one of the major concerns of the tech world these days. Developers have to ensure that batteries are not only efficient and capable of providing sufficient support to gadgets, but most important of all, they can withstand high temperatures without exploding.

The explosion-scare in batteries is even though not very high when it comes to phones, but exploding hoverboard batteries have made everyone sit up and listen. Fires caused by malfunctioning hoverboards actually forced retailer websites to take the product off and stop selling them for a while.

An exploded hoverboard.

But it looks like a team of scientists at Stanford University have found a cure for these lithium-ion batteries in hoverboards that are the culprit behind all these fires. The team of researchers have developed a lithium battery that has a plastic over-lay filled with nickel particles. If this battery gets over-heated, it shuts down and cuts all power-supply. The supply is resumed only once the temperature has dropped to a safe level. This will ensure that the battery’s electrolyte never catches fire.

The same tech of self-shut down has been seen in batteries previously as well if they sense an explosion threat. However once they shut down, the battery is not functional again. This is primarily what this new battery will be able to take care of, among other things. Though these explosion-proof lithium batteries seem to hold great potential, there are still several years before they can be produced and used in smartphones and other gadgets on a mass scale. We wouldn’t advise you to get your hopes high about them hoverboards just yet.