Evaluating Electrolyte-Anode Interface Stability in Sodium All-Solid-State Batteries.

All-solid-state batteries have recently gained considerable attention due to their potential improvements in safety, energy density, and cycle-life compared to conventional liquid electrolyte batteries. Sodium all-solid-state batteries also offer the potential to eliminate costly materials containing lithium, nickel, and cobalt, making them ideal for emerging grid energy storage applications. However, significant work is required to understand the persisting limitations and long-term cyclability of Na all-solid-state-based batteries.

Bridging nano- and microscale X-ray tomography for battery research by leveraging artificial intelligence.

X-ray computed tomography (CT) is a non-destructive imaging technique in which contrast originates from the materials' absorption coefficient. The recent development of laboratory nanoscale CT (nano-CT) systems has pushed the spatial resolution for battery material imaging to voxel sizes of 50 nm, a limit previously achievable only with synchrotron facilities. Given the non-destructive nature of CT, in situ and operando studies have emerged as powerful methods to quantify morphological parameters, such as tortuosity factor, porosity, surface area and volume expansion, during battery operation or cycling.

New insights into Li distribution in the superionic argyrodite LiPSCl.

By using temperature-dependent neutron powder diffraction combined with maximum entropy method analysis, a previously unreported Li lattice site was discovered in the argyrodite LiPSCl solid-state electrolyte. This new finding enables a more complete description of the Li diffusion model in argyrodites, providing structural guidance for designing novel high-conductivity solid-state electrolytes.

Near-Real-Time Learner Analysis and Faculty Support During a Transition to Online Education.

Unlabelled: The teaching tip described here relates to a department level initiative to gather and act on student experiences in real-time during the COVID-19 outbreak in the Spring 2020 semester. The survey was developed to be an ongoing, department level, data collection source that could capture, triage, and react to student's unique situations as they arose. This enabled us to coordinate across courses, follow-up and provide students and instructors assistance in real time, and also gather information that informed decision making for our summer online courses as well as our planning for the fall.