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Trio awarded Nobel prize in chemistry for working on lithium-ion batteries

Dunya News

Lithium-ion batteries have brought the greatest benefit to humankind, the academy said.

(Dunya News/AFP) – Three scientists, John B Goodenough, M Stanley Whittingham and Akira Yoshino, in the field of chemistry were awarded Nobel prize for their work in developing lithium-ion batteries, paving the way for smartphones and a fossil fuel-free society.

According to an international news agency, John B Goodenough of the University of Texas at Austin, M Stanley Whittingham of Binghamton University and Akira Yoshino of Meijo University will receive equal shares of the share the nine million Swedish kronor (about $914,000 or 833,000 euros) prize equally, which was announced by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm on Wednesday.

John Goodenough of the United States -- at 97 the oldest person to be awarded a Nobel prize.

"This lightweight, rechargeable and powerful battery is now used in everything from mobile phones to laptops and electric vehicles... (and) can also store significant amounts of energy from solar and wind power, making possible a fossil fuel-free society," the jury said.

"Lithium batteries have revolutionised our lives since they first entered the market in 1991," and were "of the greatest benefit to humankind".

Lithium-ion batteries have long been tipped for the award, not least since they have proved pivotal in the development of the high-tech world we inhabit.

“Lithium-ion batteries have brought the greatest benefit to humankind,” the academy said.

Far lighter and more compact that earlier types of rechargeable battery, they are found in everything from mobile phones to laptops and electric cars.

“The [electric car] batteries no longer weigh two tonnes, but 300kg,” said Prof Sara Snogerup Linse, a member of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry. “The ability to store energy from renewable sources, the sun, the wind, opens up for sustainable energy consumption,” she added.

When asked how it felt to receive the call, Yoshino simply said “Amazing, surprising”.

Seeking an alternative source of power during the oil crisis of the 1970s, Whittingham discovered a way to harness the potential energy in lithium, a metal so light it floats on water.

He constructed a battery partly made of lithium that utilised the element’s natural tendency to shed electrons, thereby transferring energy.

However the battery was too unstable to be used.

Speaking in an interview with the Times earlier this year, Goodenough said he had not appreciated the impact his work would have.

“At the time we developed the battery it was just something to do,” he said. “I didn’t know what electrical engineers would do with the battery. I really didn’t anticipate cellphones, camcorders and everything else.”

Wednesday was already expected to be a particularly good day for Goodenough – he is to receive the prestigious Copley medal at the Royal Society in London in the evening.

Prof Mark Miodownik, a materials expert at University College London, said it was right that lithium-ion batteries were celebrated. “They are one of the most influential pieces of materials science that influence the modern life of everyone on the planet,” he said.

“It is remarkable too that although 30 years old, they have not been eclipsed by a better battery technology even now, which makes you realise what a remarkable discovery they are.”

Batteries work by turning chemical energy into electricity. A typical battery is made up of two electrodes, an anode and a cathode, which are usually separated by a liquid that can carry charged particles.

Both electrodes are connected to an electrical circuit. When the battery is powering an electrical device, electrons travel from the anode to the cathode through the electrical circuit, while positively charge ions move through the electrolyte. In a rechargeable battery, energy can be put into the device to reverse this process.

While rechargeable batteries were around in the 1970s, they had drawbacks, not least in the amount of energy they could store. Lithium, it was thought, could be an answer since it is a very light metal and easily loses an electron. However, lithium’s reactivity also made it tricky to harness.

In the 1970s Stanley Whittingham cracked the problem when looking to develop approaches for fossil-free energy in light of the oil crisis. His device, the first functional lithium battery, used lithium metal in the anode and lithium ions tucked into titanium disulphide for the cathode. Unfortunately, when this battery was repeatedly recharged, it ran the risk of exploding – a situation the local fire brigade were, apparently, none too pleased about. To improve safety, Whittingham combined metallic lithium with aluminium in the anode.

Goodenough picked up the baton at the University of Oxford, and replaced the titanium disulphide in the cathode with cobalt oxide – an approach that doubled the voltage produced.

Yoshino used the cathode developed by Goodenough to create the first commercially-viable lithium-ion battery in 1985, with the anode in his battery composed of lithium ions and electrons housed within a carbon material called petroleum coke.

The upshot was a lightweight, compact battery that could be recharged many, many times – the bedrock of modern technology. The battery continues to be developed, not least to improve its environmental impact.

For Yoshino, a good scientist needed two qualities.

"One thing is that you have to have a flexible brain. Flexibility. The other is tenacity. You stay persistent and never give up."

Yoshino, 71, works at the Asahi Kasei Corporation in Tokyo and is a professor at Meijo University in Nagoya, Japan, while Goodenough holds the Cockrell Chair in Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin.

Whittingham, 77, is a professor at the Binghamton University, State University of New York.

The trio will receive the prize from King Carl XVI Gustaf at a formal ceremony in Stockholm on December 10, the anniversary of the 1896 death of scientist Alfred Nobel who created the prizes in his last will and testament.

Prof Dame Carol Robinson, president of the Royal Society of Chemistry, said battery technology remains an exciting field.

“It’s not the end of the journey, as lithium is a finite resource and many scientists around the world are building on the foundations laid by these three brilliant chemists,” she said.

Peace Prize on Friday

They were rewarded for research into how human cells sense and adapt to changing oxygen levels, opening up new strategies to fight such diseases as cancer and anaemia.

On Tuesday, the Physics Prize went to Canadian-American cosmologist James Peebles and Swiss astronomers Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz for research on how the Universe evolved after the Big Bang, and the first discovery of a planet outside our solar system, known as an exoplanet.

The Literature Prize will follow on Thursday, with two laureates to be crowned after a sexual harassment scandal forced the Swedish Academy to postpone the 2018 award, for the first time in 70 years.

Names creating a buzz ahead of this year’s literature prize include Canadian poet Anne Carson, Kenyan writer Ngugi Wa Thiong’o, Romanian poet and novelist Mircea Cartarescu and Polish writer and activist Olga Tokarczuk.

On Friday the action moves to Norway where the Peace Prize is awarded, with bookies predicting a win for Swedish teen climate activist Greta Thunberg.

The Economics Prize will wrap up the Nobel prize season on Monday, October 14.

 

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