Electrode Materials for Lithium Ion Batteries: A Review

Electrochemical energy storage systems are categorized into different types, according to their mechanisms, including capacitors, supercapacitors, batteries and fuel cells. All battery systems include some main components: anode, cathode, an aqueous/non-aqueous electrolyte and a membrane that separates anode and cathode while being permeable to ions. Being one of the key parts of any new electronic device or electric vehicles, lithium ion batteries have gained great attention in recent years. Lithium ion batteries store/provide energy by insertion/extraction of lithium ions in/from the structure of the electrode materials in successive charge/discharge cycles. The energy and power densities, determine the batteries performance. In order to improve the energy/power density and cyclic life of a lithium ion battery, its electrode materials and electrolyte must be properly chosen. Cathode materials store energy through intercalation or conversion reactions, while the energy storage mechanism in anode materials are intercalation, conversion reactions or alloying/dealloying. Depending on the electrode material, one or more of the aforementioned mechanisms may take place which directly affect the battery performance. Each group of electrode materials have their own advantages and shortcomings; therefore, proper selection of the electrode material is an important issue in applicability of a lithium ion battery. This review covers the principles of energy storage in lithium ion batteries, anode and cathode materials and the related mechanisms, recent advancements and finally the challenges associated with enhancement of lithium ion batteries

Experimental investigation and theoretical prediction of extrudate swell using conformational rheological models

In this study the extrudate swell of polymer solutions is estimated using the microstructure of polymer molecules. When a flexible polymer chain goes through a narrow die shear stress exerting on the chain will cause the polymer chain to be stretched along the flow direction. After emerging from die all external stresses vanish immediately and the chains tend to recover their previous state due to elastic recovery. This phenomenon will results in a gradual increase in extrudate diameter and this is used as the key idea for estimating swell ratio. A Giesekus based conformational model was used in order to predict polymer chains microstructure everywhere in the domain. The resulting PDE set including, continuity, momentum, and conformational theological model were solved using a finite volume method with the OpenFOAM software. Numerical results were compared with experimental data which were obtained for aqueous solutions of Carboxymethylcellulose. It was found that model predictions are in good agreement with experimental data. The results were also compared to results which were obtained by the Tanner relation which underestimates experimental data

Simulation of flow of short fiber suspensions through a planar contraction

In this study, the flow of a fiber filled viscoelastic matrix through planar contractions is investigated. It was found that by adding fiber to the matrix vortex, the intensity increases. Fiber orientation along "x" and "y" axes was studied too. It was found that fiber orientation could be used for determining the flow regime through the contraction geometry. The rigidity condition of fibers, which needs the trace of the orientation tensor to be unity everywhere in the domain, is correct except near walls and the reentrant corner, which is slightly less than one. In these regions, the stress magnitude is higher, which results in more numerical errors, and which further leads to some error in predicting the orientation tensor. The first normal stress difference distribution along different axes was also studied in this article. It was found that increasing the volume concentration of fibers results in first normal stress difference intensification

Flow of a PTT fluid through planar contractions : vortex inhibition using rounded corners

Contraction flow is one of important geometries in fluid flow both in Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids. In this study, flow of a viscoelastic fluid through a planar 4:1 contraction with rounded corners was investigated. Six different rounding ratios (RR=0, 0.125, 0.25, 0.375, 0.438, 0.475, 0.488) was examined using the linear PTT constitutive equation at creeping flow and isothermal condition. Then the resulting PDE set including continuity, momentum, and PTT constitutive equations were implemented to the OpenFOAM software. The results clearly show vortex deterioration with increasing rounding diameter, so that when rounding corner exceeds a critical value, the vortex disappears completely. This phenomenon was also observed at different upstream widths. Furthermore, by increasing rounding diameter, the diminishing vortex approaches to the re-entrant corner