New super capacitors without carbon come out with better electric storage performance than existing carbon based materials

MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) recently announced the latest research results of its scientists published in nature materials science: they have developed the first carbon free supercapacitor with performance exceeding that of carbon based materials In the future, it can be used not only in new energy fields such as electric vehicles, but also in the production of color changing windows with adjustable brightness and chemical sensors for detecting trace chemicals Because of the high speed of charge and discharge and the high power density, super capacitor has become a research hotspot in energy storage system However, the current supercapacitors are made of carbon based materials, including carbon nanotubes, graphene and activated carbon These carbon containing supercapacitors need high temperature above 800 ℃ and strong irritant chemicals in the production process "And now we've found a new kind of super capacitor material that doesn't contain carbon." Said Mircea Dinka, assistant chemistry professor at MIT Super capacitors can also keep flashlights on for a long time after they are turned off This new kind of capacitor is made of a kind of material called metal organic framework (MOFs) MOFs is short for metal organic framework It is a kind of organic-inorganic hybrid material with periodic network structure, which is formed by self-assembly of inorganic metal centers (metal ions or metal clusters) and bridging organic ligands It is different from inorganic porous materials and general organic complexes It has both the rigidity of inorganic materials and the flexibility of organic materials MOFs has a porous structure like a sponge, and its surface area is much larger than that of carbon based materials But MOFs have a big drawback: they don't have the electronic conductivity required by super capacitors Dinka said that although it was considered extremely difficult for them to make MOFs conductive, they finally showed the very good ionic conductivity of MOFs The test results show that the energy loss of the new super capacitor is less than 10% after 10000 times of charging and discharging, which is equivalent to or even better than the existing carbon based materials in the performance of many key performance parameters However, Dinka said that MOFs has great potential for optimization After optimization of its surface area, it can completely reach three times of the existing carbon based materials, and its electricity storage will reach an amazing height In addition to being slightly more expensive than carbon based materials, MOFs has obvious advantages, large surface area, and no more severe temperature and chemical conditions in production In the future, in addition to super capacitors, it can also be used to store natural gas, produce windows with adjustable brightness and chemical detectors for medical or safety testing If the super capacitor is used in the car one day, charging will no longer be the bottleneck of the promotion of electric vehicles Unfortunately, perfect capacitor materials are more difficult to develop than battery electrode materials This combination of metals and organics is eye-catching Maybe the super capacitor is not so far away, it's already in the bright place of willow Several major technical directions of large capacity energy storage are still in competition Can super capacitors collide with lines first? rub one's eyes and wait.