Topic: Next-generation Battery Technologies

Speaker: Prof. Arumugam Manthiram
　　　　　The University of Texas at Austin, Austin

Abstract：

Rapid increases in global energy use and growing environmental concerns have prompted the development of clean, sustainable, alternative energy technologies. Electrical energy storage (EES) is critical to efficiently utilize electricity produced from intermittent, renewable sources like solar and wind as well as to electrify the transportation sector. Rechargeable batteries are prime candidates for EES, but widespread adoption requires optimization of cost, cycle life, safety, energy density, power density, and environmental impact, all of which are directly linked to severe materials challenges. After providing a brief account of the current status of lithium-ion technology, this presentation will focus on the development of new materials, cell chemistry, and cell configurations to overcome the current problems. Particularly, the challenges and approaches of transitioning from the current insertion-compound electrodes in lithium-ion batteries to new conversion-reaction electrodes with multi-electron transfer to increase the energy density and lower the cost with earth-abundant elements like sulfur, oxygen, sodium, and zinc will be presented. For example, (i) lithium-sulfur and sodium-sulfur cells with high sulfur loading and suppressed polysulfide crossover, (ii) hybrid lithium-air cells in which a solid electrolyte separates the lithium-metal anode in a nonaqueous electrolyte from the air electrode in an aqueous catholyte, (iii) lithium-metal anode stabilization, and (iv) low-cost, safe aqueous systems, such as zinc-air and zinc-bromine cells, with a novel mediator solid lithium- or sodium-ion electrolyte will be presented.

Biography

Arumugam Manthiram is currently the Cockrell Family Regents Chair in Engineering and Director of the Texas Materials Institute and the Materials Science and Engineering Program at the University of Texas at Austin (UT-Austin). He received his Ph.D. degree in chemistry from the Indian Institute of Technology at Madras in 1981. After working as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oxford and at UT-Austin, he became a faculty member in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at UT-Austin in 1991. Dr. Manthiram’s research is focused on clean energy technologies: rechargeable batteries, fuel cells, supercapacitors, and solar cells. He has authored more than 600 journal articles with 31,000 citations and an h-index of 91. He has graduated 50 Ph.D. students and 25 M.S. students and is currently directing a large research group with about 30 graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. He is the Regional (USA) Editor of Solid State Ionics and is on the editorial boards of 10 journals. He is a Fellow of the Materials Research Society, Electrochemical Society, American Ceramic Society, Royal Society of Chemistry, American Association for the Advancement of Science, and World Academy of Materials and Manufacturing Engineering. He received the Outstanding Graduate Teaching Award (one university-wide award per year) in 2012, the Battery Division Research Award from the Electrochemical Society in 2014, the Distinguished Alumnus Award of the Indian Institute of Technology Madras in 2015, and the Billy and Claude R. Hocott Distinguished Centennial Engineering Research Award in 2016.