Microstructural Design Principles of Battery Electrodes

During battery operation, lithium ions follow a tortuous path around a densely packed distribution of particles. The morphology, size, and spatial arrangement of these particles directly influences the performance of a lithium ion battery in terms of the delivered power and energy density. As energy demands continue to grow and evolve, microstructural optimization is becoming increasingly important for unlocking the full potential of lithium ion batteries. Existing microstructural optimization strategies are based on trial and error during electrode fabrication. As a part of this work, we are developing a generalized theoretical framework to evaluate the microstructural performance of different lithium-ion battery architectures, and the processing techniques used to make them.