Charge the phone in a minute, but how?

New research by scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder has the potential to create technology that could charge a phone or laptop within a minute.

In research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, scientists in Anker Gupta’s lab discovered how tiny charged particles — ions — move through a complex network of tiny pores.

Anker Gupta said the breakthrough could help create efficient energy storage devices such as supercapacitors.

Given the important role energy will play in the future, Anker said, he is excited to apply his knowledge of chemical engineering to advanced energy storage devices.

Several chemical engineering techniques are used to study the flow of ions in porous materials such as oil reservoirs and water filtration, Anker Gupta said. However, they have not been fully utilized in some energy storage systems.

The discovery is not only important for energy storage in vehicles or electrical appliances, but could also be useful in power grids where efficient storage is needed to prevent energy loss during fluctuations in energy demand.

Supercapacitors (energy storage devices that rely on the accumulation of ions in their pores) have faster charging times and longer lifetimes than batteries.