Goodbye, EV range anxiety? Indian-origin researcher unveils technique to fully charge electric vehicles within minutes!

According to a recent online survey by The Economic Times, the majority of Indians cite one recurring issue holding them back from fully transitioning to an electric vehicle: range anxiety. Unlike petrol stations — whose vast numbers can almost rival the pani puri sellers in our country — charging infrastructure for EVs remainly severely limited in even our developed metro cities, much less the rest of the country.

But imagine a future where a short chai and stretch break is enough to fully charge your electric car on a road trip. This once-futuristic vision is inching closer to reality, thanks to pioneering new study co-written by Ankur Gupta, a researcher of Indian origin at the University of Colorado.

The research, which leverages the movement of tiny charged particles called ions, holds immense promise in revolutionising energy storage, making devices faster and more efficient than ever. Reports have suggested that this harnessing this technology could help charge a dead smartphone within a minute, or an electric car in just ten minutes.

The charges that drive electricity work shockingly similar to fluids. For example, it isn’t entirely inaccurate to compare a battery to a pump that helps to maintain a constant flow of water. Gupta’s innovative research draws inspiration from similar fluidic processes, and pushes it to the extreme.

The study repurposes chemical engineering techniques traditionally used for studying fluid flow in porous materials, such as oil reservoirs and water filtration systems. In particular, they focused on supercapacitors — battery-like energy storage devices used in EVs known for their rapid charging capabilities and longevity.

“Supercapacitors are prized for their speed,” Gupta explained. “Our challenge was to accelerate the charging and discharging processes by enhancing ion movement efficiency.”

You can think of an ion as a frenzied atom or molecule that carries a charge. This makes them highly reactive and constantly attracted to other particles with the opposite charge. The flow of ions makes part of what we know as current in our electronics.

Meanwhile, supercapacitors store energy by accumulating ions in their pores. Gupta’s team discovered that ion movement at the intersections of these pores deviates significantly from what Kirchhoff’s law describes. This law, established in 1845, governs current flow in electrical circuits and is a cornerstone of electrical engineering. Ankur’s research is thus, quite literally, rewriting electrical engineering as we know it.

By harnessing what they learned from this groundbreaking research, Gupta and his team believe that we can massively improve the movement of ions through supercapacitors, thereby improving the rate with which we charge and release energy. The implications of this research extend beyond personal electronics to electric vehicles and power grids, where efficient energy storage is crucial to balancing supply and demand.

As the global demand for efficient and sustainable energy solutions grows, Gupta's research marks a pivotal step forward. It opens up a world of possibilities for energy storage innovation, potentially making ultra-fast charging a commonplace feature in the near future.

“The future of our planet hinges on energy innovation,” Gupta remarks. “We found the missing link.”

The findings of this research have been published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and can be accessed here.