Will the battery be made from tree roots in the future?

For many years now, scientists around the world have developed a number of technologies that allow for recharging in an environmentally friendly way, such as recharging with a temperature change or a unique one. How to charge the battery from the anxiety of the user itself.

However, perhaps these methods are still not as good as developing a completely new battery, using green materials instead of finite metal ores such as cobalt - the raw material for most. the current batteries. And that's exactly what the team of talented scientists from New York City University, Rice University and the US Army Laboratory have done. They succeeded in producing a new Li-ion battery with a red dye extracted from the herbaceous roots.

Called rose madder or purpurin , this dye was previously used by the ancients to dye the fabric into orange, red and pink. One lucky thing for the future of the battery industry is that these color molecules contain carbonyl and hydroxyl groups that can become an electrode. Equally important is the process of dye purpurin is much easier than other types of organic materials.

"These carbonyl and hydroxyl groups are electron-rich molecules that easily combine with lithium in a Li-ion battery," said Professor Geogre John of New York City University. It will take years to bring this product into mass production but surely in the future, it will be time for us to say that the battery actually "grows in the tree" . In the era of increasingly scarce natural ores, this eco-friendly battery will be a promising pin for the world's battery industry.