Wetting of the liquid
metal on the solid electrolyte of a liquid
metal battery controls the operating temperature and performance of
the battery. Liquid sodium electrodes are particularly attractive
because of their low cost, natural abundance, and geological distribution.
However, they wet poorly on a solid electrolyte near its melting temperature,
limiting their widespread suitability for low-temperature batteries
to be used for large-scale energy storage systems. Herein, we develop
an isolated metal-island strategy that can improve sodium wetting
in sodium-beta alumina batteries that allows operation at lower temperatures.
Our results suggest that in situ heat treatment of a solid electrolyte
followed by bismuth deposition effectively eliminates oxygen and moisture
from the surface of the solid electrolyte, preventing the formation
of an oxide layer on the liquid sodium, leading to enhanced wetting.
We also show that employing isolated bismuth islands significantly
improves cell performance, with cells retaining 94% of their charge
after the initial cycle, an improvement over cells without bismuth
islands. These results suggest that coating isolated metal islands
is a promising and straightforward strategy for the development of
low-temperature sodium-β alumina batteries.
Controlling ion transport in nanofluidics is fundamental to water purification, bio-sensing, energy storage, energy conversion, and numerous other applications. For any of these, it is essential to design nanofluidic channels that are stable in the liquid phase and enable specific ions to pass. A human neuron is one such system, where electrical signals are transmitted by cation transport for high-speed communication related to neuromorphic computing. Here, we present a concept of neuro-inspired energy harvesting that uses confined van der Waals crystal and demonstrate a method to maximise the ion diffusion flux to generate an electromotive force. The confined nanochannel is robust in liquids as in neuron cells, enabling steady-state ion diffusion for hundred of hours and exhibiting ion selectivity of 95.8%, energy conversion efficiency of 41.4%, and power density of 5.26 W/m2. This fundamental understanding and rational design strategy can enable previously unrealisable applications of passive-type large-scale power generation.
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