Researchers have made a battery that can both hold high energy and deliver high power.

Batteries typically can hold a lot of energy but discharge it at low rates. To make a material capable of both high energy and high power, a team led by Yan Yu at the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei placed sodium vanadium triphosphate (Na3V2(PO4)3) inside a mixture of reduced graphene oxide and carbon nanotubes to improve the sodium compound's conductivity. They deposited the material onto a current-collecting stainless steel support, avoiding the use of additives that would reduce the performance of the device.

The team made a battery with the porous material and showed that the device could deliver high levels of energy at a high rate. It also kept 96% of its capacity even after being charged and discharged 2,000 times. The approach could be used with other electrode materials, the authors say.

Adv. Mater. http://doi.org/f3kvx3 (2016)