Japan’s Akira Yoshino among 3 winners of Nobel Prize in chemistry
«Lithium-ion batteries have revolutionized our lives since they first entered the market in 1991. They have laid the foundation of a wireless, fossil fuel-free society, and are of the greatest benefit to humankind,» the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said, Kyodo News reports.
Yoshino, 71, is honorary fellow at Japanese chemical company Asahi Kasei Corp. and a professor at Meijo University. A 97-year-old U.S. chemist Goodenough, 97, holds the Cockrell Centennial Chair in Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin, while Whittingham is a distinguished professor at Binghamton University.
The academy said Whittingham in the 1970s created an innovative cathode in a lithium battery from titanium disulphide which can store lithium ions.
Goodenough, predicting that the cathode would have a greater potential if made using a metal oxide, demonstrated in 1980 that cobalt oxide can help create more powerful batteries, it said.
Based on Goodenough's cathode research, Yoshino used a carbon material in the anode and in 1985 created the first commercially viable lithium-ion batteries, lightweight rechargeable power sources currently used in a wide range of electronic devices including smartphones and laptop computers.
«The advantage of lithium-ion batteries is that they are not based upon chemical relations that break down the electrodes, but upon lithium ions flowing back and forth between the anode and cathode,» the academy said.