Battery that can be spray painted onto almost any surface
 

Anyone else see this story?

Rice University Develops Battery That Can Be Spray-Painted Onto Almost Any Surface



When this correspondent told a coworker that researchers at Rice University had developed a paintable battery, his response was to sharpie an Eveready AA and hand it back. Perhaps a better description is (odd as it sounds) battery-able paint. As in, a paint that can be sprayed onto almost any surface, that holds and discharges energy.

With the technology, "we can convert almost any object to a battery," said Neelam Singh, a researcher in the project to InnovationNewsDaily. "Spray painting is already an industrial process, so it would be very easy to incorporate this into industry."

A more detailed breakdown of the technology, published in Scientific Reports, reveals the same essential elements of a battery are present in both the conventional and spray-on versions. A standard battery, built of bulkier components, maximizes volume to surface area ratios by rolling all the components into a tube; by contrast, the spray-on battery lays down those same elements in a series of thinly layered paints.

The resulting lithium-ion battery, reports CNET, barely loses capacity after 60 full charge/discharge cycles. A set of nine fully charged battery-painted bathroom tiles, hooked into an LED set that read "Rice" remained lit for 6 hours on a steady 2.4-volt diet.

Sing told the Associated Press that, for the time being, some of the materials involved are too toxic for outdoor use, but with a little tinkering environmentally-friendly alternatives will be found. When that happens, the batteries could be prime for solar energy development.

Dat technology

pretty cool, but it seems really impractical right now for consumer use.