Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba

Toshiba Battery Co., Ltd.

Murata Manufacturing Co., Ltd.

Hiroyuki Hasebe

Norio Takami

Motoya Kanda

Takahisa Ohsaki

Asako Satoh

Koichi Kawamura

Kenichi Takahashi

Masahiro Sekino

Masashi Fujiwara

Takashi Kuboki

Shuji Yamada

Nobuyasu Negishi

Asako Sato

Hideaki Yasui

Takashi Shimoyamada

Yukinori Akamoto

Yuji Sato

Hiroyuki Takahashi

Takao Sawa

Noriaki Yagi

Yoshiyuki Isozaki

Nobuo Shibuya

Kaoru Koiwa

Hiromichi Horie

Hirotaka Hayashida

Shusuke Inada

Hirotaka Sakai

Takamichi Inaba

Jun Momma

Hideyuki Oozu

Masayuki Oguchi

Hiromi Shizu

Hidenori Suzuki

Kazuta Takeno

Kiyoshi Mitsuyasu

Yoshiko Kanazawa

Kiyoshi Senoue

Yoshie Ozeki

Ichirou Sawatari

Hideki Yoshida

Makoto Kato

Kazuhiro Yoshida

Masaaki Yamamoto

Hirohisa Miyamoto

Norihiro Tomimatsu

Masayuki Suzuki

Tomohisa Arai

Masato Akita

Hiroyasu Sumino

Yasuo Matsuoka

Ken-ichi Kanno

Naoyuki Sori

Shinji Tsuruta

Kinya Usuda

Takashi Tsuchiya

Hirofumi Kan

Kunihiko Sasaki

Yuichi Yoshida

Nao Shimura

Kiyoshi Ishitsuka

Yuuichi Sato

Katuyuki Hata

Shigeo Fukuda

Masayuki Onuma

Ken Komiyama

Motoi Goto

Hidekazu Oppata

Genta Oomichi

Takahisa Osaki

Koji Ishiwa

Makoto Miyahara

Michiyuki Kitamoto

The present invention provides a nonaqueous electrolyte secondary battery, comprising an electrode group including a positive electrode, a negative electrode including a material for absorbing-desorbing lithium ions, and a separator arranged between the positive electrode and the negative electrode, a nonaqueous electrolyte impregnated in the electrode group and including a nonaqueous solvent and a lithium salt dissolved in the nonaqueous solvent, and a jacket for housing the electrode group and having a thickness of 0.3 mm or less, wherein the nonaqueous solvent &#x3b3;-butyrolactone in an amount larger than 50% by volume and not larger than 95% by volume based on the total amount of the nonaqueous solvent.

Nonaqueous electrolyte secondary battery

According to one embodiment, a fuel cell includes an electric-power generator, a fuel distribution mechanism, and a pump. The electric-power generator includes a membrane electrode assembly including an anode, a cathode, and an electrolytic membrane. The fuel distribution mechanism includes a container and a thin tube. The container includes a fuel discharge surface, and contains the electric-power generator inside. The thin tube is formed in the container in a manner that a fuel outlet and a fuel inlet communicate with each other. The pump is connected directly to the fuel inlet.

Fuel cell

The present invention relates to a fuel cell including: a membrane electrode assembly () having a fuel electrode (), an air electrode (), and an electrolyte membrane () sandwiched therebetween; and a fuel storage unit () storing a liquid fuel. The fuel cell is capable of continuously generating electricity for long hours only by being replenished with a fuel, and therefore, attempts have been made to miniaturize the fuel cell to use it as a power source of portable electronic devices. When the membrane electrode assembly and the fuel storage unit in the fuel cell are connected via a flow path, a fuel supply state becomes uneven depending on the shape and the like of the flow path even though a supply amount of the fuel can be adjusted, which causes a problem such as a decrease in an output of the fuel cell. The present invention solves the aforethe problem by providing, in the fuel cell, a fuel distributing mechanism () which supplies the fuel to a plurality of places of the fuel electrode, and connecting the fuel distributing mechanism and the fuel storage unit via the flow path ().

A liquid fuel cell unit which outputs a first voltage, a boosting circuit which boosts the first voltage output from the liquid fuel cell unit, and outputs a boosted second voltage to an electronic apparatus, and a first control circuit are included. The first control circuit compares the first voltage output from the liquid fuel cell unit with a preset first threshold voltage, and controls the boosting circuit in accordance with the comparison result such that the first voltage does not fall below the first threshold voltage, or the first voltage holds the first threshold voltage or more.

Liquid fuel cell system and boosting unit of the same

In electronic equipment using a fuel cell as a power source, an antenna and a fuel cell, which are provided in a lower case of a main body receiving electronic parts, are arranged at a given distance from each other. An acceptable communication state can be established in the electronic equipment.

Electronic equipment

A PDA, which functions as an electronic unit, includes power supply which includes a fuel cell unit and an auxiliary power supply which is charged by an output of the fuel cell unit. A non-use state of the PDA is detected by non-use detection unit. Upon detection of the non-use state by the non-use detection unit, the output from the fuel cell unit is stopped and an output of the auxiliary power supply is shut off.

Electronic apparatus and fuel cell system

A coupler including a nozzle and a socket. The nozzle includes a nozzle body, a movable pin, and a first supporting member. The movable pin is made retractably movable in the axial direction in a nose portion to open and close the channel inside the nozzle. The socket includes a housing, a collar, a ring-like packing, a valve stem, a valve head, and a second supporting member. The valve stem is made retractably movable in the socket in the axial direction to open and close the channel inside the socket. All portions or components which contact liquid fuel in the coupler are formed solely of rubber and/or plastics.

Coupler, fuel cell employing the coupler and fuel cartridge

The invention provides a fuel cartridge for supplying methanol aqueous solution to a direct methanol fuel cell system, comprising a memory which stores at least a concentration of the methanol aqueous solution.

Direct methanol fuel cell system, fuel cartridge, and memory for fuel cartridge

There is proposed a non-aqueous electrolyte secondary battery having an electrode assembly which is impregnated with a non-aqueous electrolyte solution, wherein the battery can be made thin while maintaining improved capacity, large-current characteristics and cycle life. The non-aqueous electrolyte secondary battery comprises a positive electrode, a negative electrode, a separator and a non-aqueous electrolyte solution. The production process of the battery comprises steps of preparing an electrode assembly by interposing a separator between a positive electrode and a negative electrode, impregnating the electrode assembly with an organic solvent which can dissolve the binder of the positive- and/or negative electrodes, bonding the positive electrode and the separator together and bonding the negative electrode and the separator together by drying the electrode assembly, and impregnating the electrode assembly with a non-aqueous electrolyte solution.

Method of binding an electrolyte assembly to form a non-aqueous electrolyte secondary battery

Disclosed is a nonaqueous electrolyte secondary battery, comprising a nonaqueous electrolyte containing ethylene carbonate and &#x3b3;-butyrolactone, wherein, when a charge-discharge cycle test satisfying conditions (A) to (D) given below is performed under an environment of 45&#xb0; C., the capacity retention rate at 100-th charge-discharge cycle is at least 85% based on the discharge capacity in the first charge-discharge cycle, (A) for the charging, the constant current-constant voltage charging to 4.2V is performed for 3 hours under a current of 1C, (B) the discharging is performed to 3V under a current of 1C, (C) after the charging, the secondary battery is left to stand for 10 minutes, followed by performing the discharging, and (D) after the discharging, the secondary battery is left to stand for 10 minutes, followed by performing the charging.

Nonaqueous electrolyte and nonaqueous electrolyte secondary battery

The display unit comprises a display device such as liquid crystal cell or the like; and a secondary battery disposed to a rear side of the display device. A heat shielding layer having a thermal conductivity of at most 5 W/mK, preferably at most 1 W/mK is formed as a heat shielding plate between the display device and the secondary battery, and the display device and the secondary battery are integrally assembled to form a module structure. According to the above structure of the present invention, since the display device such as liquid crystal cell or the like and the secondary battery are integrally assembled to form a module structure, the display unit can be made compact and thin to attain a light weight.

Display unit and mobile apparatus using the unit

Disclosed is a nonaqueous electrolyte secondary battery, comprising a case having a wall thickness not larger than 0.3 mm, a positive electrode provided in the case, a negative electrode provided in the case and the negative electrode containing a carbonaceous material capable of absorbing-desorbing lithium ions, and a nonaqueous electrolyte provided in the case and the nonaqueous electrolyte containing a nonaqueous solvent including &#x3b3;-butyrolactone and a solute dissolved in the nonaqueous solvent, wherein after being discharged to 3V with a current of 0.2 C at room temperature, the voltage reduction caused by the self-discharge at 60&#xb0; C. is not larger than 1.5V in 3 weeks.

Nonaqueous electrolyte secondary battery having a carbonaceous material containing negative electrode and a nonaqueous electrolyte containing a nonaqueous solvent

Disclosed is a nonaqueous electrolyte comprising a nonaqueous solvent which contains ethylene carbonate (EC), propylene carbonate (PC), &ggr;-butyrolactone (BL), and a fourth component, which is a solvent other than the EC, PC and BL, and the mixing ratio x (% by volume) of EC based on the total amount of the nonaqueous solvent falls within a range of between 15 and 50, the mixing ratio y (% by volume) of PC based on the total amount of the nonaqueous solvent falls within a range of between 2 and 35, the mixing ratio z (% by volume) of BL based on the total amount of the nonaqueous solvent falls within a range of between 30 and 85, and the mixing ratio p (% by volume) of the fourth component based on the total amount of the nonaqueous solvent is larger than 0 and is not larger than 5.

Growing community of inventors

Chigasaki, Japan

Hiroyuki Hasebe