Does Heat Play a Role in the Observed Behavior of Aqueous Photobatteries?

Light-rechargeable photobatteries have emerged as an elegant solution to address the intermittency of solar irradiation by harvesting and storing solar energy directly through a battery electrode. Recently, a number of compact two-electrode photobatteries have been proposed, showing increases in capacity and open-circuit voltage upon illumination. Here, we analyze the thermal contributions to this increase in capacity under galvanostatic and photocharging conditions in two promising photoactive cathode materials, VO and LiMnO.

Three-dimensional operando optical imaging of particle and electrolyte heterogeneities inside Li-ion batteries.

Understanding (de)lithiation heterogeneities in battery materials is key to ensure optimal electrochemical performance. However, this remains challenging due to the three-dimensional morphology of electrode particles, the involvement of both solid- and liquid-phase reactants and a range of relevant timescales (seconds to hours). Here we overcome this problem and demonstrate the use of confocal microscopy for the simultaneous three-dimensional operando measurement of lithium-ion dynamics in individual agglomerate particles, and the electrolyte in batteries.

Interrogating the Light-Induced Charging Mechanism in Li-Ion Batteries Using Optical Microscopy.

Photobatteries, batteries with a light-sensitive electrode, have recently been proposed as a way of simultaneously capturing and storing solar energy in a single device. Despite reports of photocharging with multiple different electrode materials, the overall mechanism of operation remains poorly understood. Here, we use optical reflection microscopy to investigate light-induced charging in LiVO electrodes.

A mechanistic study of the dopant-induced breakdown in halide perovskites using solid state energy storage devices.

Doping halide perovskites (HPs) with extrinsic species, such as alkali metal ions, plays a critical, albeit often elusive role in optimising optoelectronic devices. Here, we use solid state lithium ion battery inspired devices with a polyethylene oxide-based polymer electrolyte to dope HPs controllably with lithium ions. We perform a suite of material analysis techniques while dynamically varying Li doping concentrations.

Solid-State Lithium-Ion Batteries as a Method for Doping Halide Perovskites with an Optical Readout of Dopant Concentration.

Controlled doping of halide perovskites is a longstanding challenge for efficient optoelectronic applications. Here, a solid-state lithium-ion battery (LIB) inspired device is used as a method of extrinsically doping a halide perovskite in a controlled and measurable fashion. The Burstein-Moss band gap shift induced by the electronic doping is measured using optical spectroscopy to monitor the fraction of injected charges that successfully n-type dope the perovskite.

Photo-Rechargeable Zinc-Ion Capacitor Using 2D Graphitic Carbon Nitride.

Off-grid energy storage devices are becoming increasingly important to power distributed applications, such as the Internet of things, and smart city ubiquitous sensor systems. To date, this has been achieved by combining an energy storage device, e.g.