Prolonging the life of clinical laboratory IT solutions

While lithium ion batteries allow clinical laboratory IT solutions and other battery-powered equipment to be recharged over and over again, they eventually lose their charge.

Scientists at Ohio State University have looked into why this happens - and may have detected a process that, if combated, could prolong the usable life of the batteries in lithium ion-powered clinical laboratory IT solutions.

The key to the loss of power is the transferral of lithium from the cathode of the cell to its anode in an irreversible movement of the material from which the battery is built.

Nanoscale coarsening of the materials on the electrodes, which enable rapid charging and discharging of the energy cell, could be to blame.

In their findings, the scientists used a broad range of scanning techniques including atomic force microscopy, transmission electron microscopy and Kelvin prove microscopy.

The university's researchers recently revealed research that could increase processing power in clinical laboratory IT solutions by using excess heat to store data using quantum spin characteristics.