Project Contact: Matthieu Dubarry
Sponsors: Office of Naval Research (APRISES); Trevi Systems
Collaborators: University of Montreal, University of Nantes
Today advanced energy conversion devices typically rely on composites electrodes made of several materials interacting with one another. Understanding their individual and combined impact on performance is essential in the pursuit of an optimized systems. Unfortunately, this investigation is often disregarded in favor of quick publishable results. In this project we used Designs of Experiments as a suitable set of statistical tools to optimize formulations and to investigate the importance of parameters in a process while minimizing resources. Defining the optimal formulation for a given set of electrode components is tedious, time consuming and will seldom lead to publication. Defining new approaches to minimize work and time to reach an optimal battery electrode composition is highly beneficial to the field. To this end, we used a Design of Experiments (DoE) approach based on a mixture design which was applied for the first time to the electrode formulation field in open literature. Consequently, the relationship between electrode composition, microstructure and electrochemical performance was uncovered on known and novel materials.
This approach is applied to two types of electrodes: high power electrodes for lithium batteries (in collaboration with the University of Montreal) and sodium intercalation electrodes (in collaboration with Trevi Systems and the University of Nantes) to investigate the feasibility of desalination batteries. Research conducted for this project is completed in the PakaLi Battery Laboratory.
Illustration of the complex architecture of Li-ion battery electrodes and associated optimization using a design of experiment.
Publications
- 2020, O. Rynne, M. Dubarry, C. Molson, E. Nicolas, D. Lepage, A. Prébé, D. Aymé-Perrot, D. Rochefort, M. Dollé, Exploiting Materials to Their Full Potential, a Li-Ion Battery Electrode Formulation Optimization Study, ACS Applied Energy Materials, Vol. 3, Issue 3, pp. 2935-2948.
- 2019, O. Rynne, M. Dubarry, C. Molson, D. Lepage, A. Prébé, D. Aymé-Perrot, D. Rochefort, M. Dollé, Designs of Experiments for Beginners—A Quick Start Guide for Application to Electrode Formulation, Batteries, Vol. 5, Issue 4, Paper 72. (Open Access: PDF)