October 11, 2019

Every year in the first week of October, the Nobel Foundation in Sweden awards Nobel Prizes to artists, economists, scientists, and peace workers who—in keeping with the vision of the Swedish chemist and industrialist Alfred Nobel—have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind. Today, World Book looks at the first three prizes, in the scientific categories of physiology or medicine, physics, and chemistry.

Nobel Prize medal (Credit: Nobel Foundation)

On Monday, October 7, 2019, the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine was given jointly to the scientists William G. Kaelin, Jr., Sir Peter J. Ratcliffe, and Gregg L. Semenza for their work showing how cells adapt to the changing availability of oxygen. Kaelin, Ratcliffe, and Semenza identified the molecular machinery that allows cells to respond to changes in oxygen levels. Their discoveries offer promising new strategies in the treatment of such diseases and maladies as anemia, cancer, heart attacks, and strokes.

William G. Kaelin, Jr., was born in New York and is a professor of medicine at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston and at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital at Harvard Medical School. Peter J. Ratcliffe of the United Kingdom is the director of clinical research at the Francis Crick Institute in London and director of the Target Discovery Institute at the University of Oxford. Gregg L. Semenza, also from New York, is a professor of genetic medicine at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.

On Tuesday, October 8, the Nobel Foundation announced the prize for physics had been awarded to the Canadian-American cosmologist James Peebles and to the Swiss scientists Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz for their work on explaining the evolution of the universe and for discovering distant exoplanets (planets beyond our solar system). Among other things, Peebles theorized how matter in the young universe swirled into galaxies. In 1995, Mayor and Queloz discovered an exoplanet orbiting a star elsewhere in our home galaxy, the Milky Way, enhancing the study of planetary systems beyond our own that could support life.

James Peebles is the Albert Einstein professor of science at Princeton University in New Jersey. Michel Mayor is an astrophysicist and professor emeritus of astronomy at the University of Geneva. Didier Queloz is a professor of physics at the Cavendish Laboratory at Cambridge University, and at the University of Geneva.

On Wednesday, October 9, the Nobel Foundation announced that John B. Goodenough of the United States, M. Stanley Whittingham of the United Kingdom, and Akira Yoshino of Japan would share the prize for chemistry for developing and refining rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. The lightweight, rechargeable, and powerful batteries are used in everything from mobile phones to laptop computers and electric vehicles. They can also store great amounts of energy from solar and wind power, further enabling the possibility of a fossil fuel-free future.

At 97 years old, John B. Goodenough is the oldest ever recipient of the Nobel Prize. He is currently the Virginia H. Cockrell Chair in Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. M. Stanley Whittingham is a distinguished professor at Binghamton University, State University of New York. Akira Yoshino is an honorary fellow at Tokyo’s Asahi Kasei Corporation and a professor at Meijo University in Nagoya, Japan.

October 26, 2016

After two recalls since the product’s release in August, South Korean electronics manufacturer Samsung announced earlier this month that it was ending production of the Galaxy Note 7, the latest edition of its smartphone-tablet hybrid (or “phablet”). The Note had serious problems with its lithium-ion batteries that were causing it to ignite and explode, injuring users and damaging property.

Lithium-ion batteries used in smartphones and other electronics can sometimes overheat and even burst into flames. Credit: © Shutterstock

Lithium-ion batteries are a type of battery found in many electronic devices. They use the element lithium as the charge-carrying ion in the electrolyte, the substance that separates the battery’s electrodes—that is, the parts that send and receive the electric current. Such batteries have stable, reversible reactions (meaning they can be recharged) and are quite powerful.

All lithium-ion batteries work by moving lithium ions from one electrode to another. The electrolytes in lithium-ion batteries are dissolved salts that contain lithium. The salts are not dissolved in water, as in many other batteries. Instead, they are dissolved in an organic (carbon-based) solvent, such as ethylene carbonate, propylene carbonate, or dimethyl carbonate. Such electrolytes, unlike water-based electrolytes, generally remain stable at high voltages. However, they have the disadvantage of conducting ions poorly. Many of these solvents are also highly flammable.

To compensate for the electrolyte’s poor conductivity, the electrodes are spread out in microscopically thin layers. The lithium ions, then, must travel only a microscopically short distance through the poorly conducting electrolyte. Manufacturers accomplish this by layering thin sheets of alternating electrode structures on top of one another.

Pressures to increase battery life in new consumer products are immense. Stronger batteries can power more demanding devices or last longer between chargings. Improved batteries could make the difference between success and failure in a competitive marketplace. As a result, engineers create lithium-ion batteries with ever-thinner electrodes and separators, hoping to cram more energy storage into the same amount of space.

If this architecture is pushed too far, the extremely thin separator, a porous (hole-filled) barrier between the electrodes, can become damaged during the manufacturing process or in everyday use. Such damage may generate heat within the battery during charging or use. If the battery gets hot enough, the separators will suffer further damage, generating more heat. Eventually, this chain reaction ignites the flammable solvent, causing a fire or explosion.

Because Samsung is not precisely sure what is causing the batteries to combust, the company is permanently halting production and recalling all Note 7′s. Samsung is not alone in having problems with lithium-ion batteries. Several other products, including other smartphones, electric cars, and “hoverboards,” have suffered similar battery failures. Engineers and materials scientists continue to work to design more efficient—and safer—batteries to power our mobile electronic world.

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