U.S. Nanocorp, Inc.

Evans Capacitor Company Incorporated

The Standard Oil Company

Kennecott Corporation

Universal Supercapacitors LLC

John R Miller

Tongsan D Xiao

Stephen M Lipka

David A Evans

Jinxiang Dai

David A Glocker

Sergey Nikolaevich Razumov

David E Reisner

Sergey Litvinenko

Samvel Kazaryan

Henry Windischmann

Scott F Grimshaw

Alexander Ivanovich Smelkov

Nikolai Fedorovich Starodubtsev

Vladimir I Kogan

Vladislav Alekseevich Karpov

Viktor Alexandrovich Dronov

The present invention is directed to methods for the automatic charging of an electrochemical electrical energy storage device. Charging may be performed until a pre-assigned voltage increment value measured across the terminals of the storage device is reached. Recurrent periods of charging and rest may be employed, with measurements of voltage taken and voltage increment determined after the passage of an assigned quantity of electrical energy. Automatic completion of the charging process is provided for, irrespective of the design features and number of energy storage devices (e.g., capacitors) in a module, the initial state of charge and/or temperature of the storage device, or the value and/or time instability of the charging current.

Method of charging double electric layer electrochemical capacitors

The disclosure relates to asymmetric supercapacitors containing: a positive electrode comprising a current collector and a first active material selected from a layered double hydroxide of formula [MM(OH)]A&#xb7;mHO where Mis at least one divalent metal, Mis at least one trivalent metal and A is an anion of charge n&#x2212;, where x is greater than zero and less than 1, n is 1, 2, 3 or 4 and m is 0 to 10; LiCoO; LiCoNiOwhere x and y are greater than zero and less than 1; LiCoNiMOwhere x and y are greater than zero and less than 1; CoSwhere x is from 1 to 1.5; MoS; Zn; activated carbon and graphite; a negative electrode containing a material selected from a carbonaceous active material, MoOand LiMoO; an aqueous electrolyte solution or a non-aqueous ionic conducting electrolyte solution containing a salt and a salt and a non-aqueous solution; and a separator plate. Alternatively, the electrolyte can be a solid electrolyte.

Asymmetric electrochemical supercapacitor and method of manufacture thereof

Asymmetric supercapacitors comprise: a positive electrode comprising a current collector and a first active material selected from the group consisting of manganese dioxide, silver oxide, iron sulfide, lithium manganese oxide, lithium cobalt oxide, lithium nickel oxide, lithium iron phosphate, and a combination comprising at least one of the foregoing active materials; a negative electrode comprising a carbonaceous active material; an aqueous electrolyte solution selected from the group consisting of aqueous solutions of hydroxides of alkali metals, aqueous solutions of carbonates of alkali metals, aqueous solutions of chlorides of alkali metals, aqueous solutions of sulfates of alkali metals, aqueous solutions of nitrates of alkali metals, and a combination comprising at least one of the foregoing aqueous solutions; and a separator plate. Alternatively, the electrolyte can be a non-aqueous ionic conducting electrolyte or a solid electrolyte.

An asymmetric supercapacitor has a positive electrode having a current collector an active material selected from the group consisting of manganese dioxide, silver oxide, iron sulfide and mixtures thereof, a negative electrode having a carbonaceous active material carbon and optional current collector, an electrolyte, and a separator plate. In a preferred embodiment at least one of the electrodes has nanostructured/nanofibrous material and in a more preferred embodiment, both electrodes have nanostructured/nanfibrous material. The electrolyte can be liquid or solid although liquid electrolytes are preferred. The asymmetric supercapacitor has improved energy density by electrically coupling an electrode of high faradaic capacity such as one having manganese oxide (MnO) with an electrode such as carbon that stores charge through charge separation at the electric double-layer. The asymmetric supercapacitor also improves power density by using high surface area nanostructured/nanofibrous electrode materials.

A capacitor includes a cathode having a coating including an oxide of one of cobalt, molybdenum, and tungsten, a nitride of a metal selected from the group consisting of titanium, vanadium, zirconium, niobium, molybdenum, and tungsten, a carbide of a metal selected from the group consisting of vanadium, niobium, molybdenum, and tungsten, an intercalation carbon cathode, or an electrically conducting polymer selected from polyacetylene, polypyrrole, poly-p-phenylene, polythiophene, poly-3-phenylthiophene, and poly-3-(4-fluorophenyl)-thiophene, an anode including a metal selected from tantalum, aluminum, niobium, zirconium, and titanium, spaced from the coating, and an electrolyte in contact with the coating and the anode.

Capacitor

Capacitor including a cathode having a nitride coating

An extended life capacitor is disclosed in which an enclosing body is made from a tantalum can and tantalum cap and enclosing a plurality of double layer capacitor cells. Each of the capacitor cells includes a conductive material, such as activated carbon, with an aqueous electrolyte therein such as dilute sulfuric acid. In the preferred embodiment, this is about 38% by weight of sulfuric acid, and the remainder water. Lead-ins are provided to make electronic connection to the two ends of the capacitor cell stack as anode and cathode electrodes. The entire unit is hermetically sealed to inhibit the loss of electrolyte from the capacitor body to less than 2% per year, and the electrodes are at least partly coated with a noble metal such as gold to limit the establishment of a spurious capacitor which would be in series with the stack of plurality cells, which would otherwise greatly decrease the capacity of the entire unit.

Extended life capacitor and method

A sputtering process for efficiently preparing amorphous semiconducting films having a reduced number of localized states is disclosed. In particular, hydrogenated semiconductor films free of polyhydrides may be prepared according to the inventive process. In one application of the process, a silicon target is simultaneously bombarded by separate beams of relatively heavy sputtering ions, such as argon ions, effective in sputtering the target at relatively high rates, and by ions of a substance effective in passivating localized states in amorphous semiconducting films, such as hydrogen ions. The products of this sputtering process are collected on remotely located substrates to form a passivated amorphous semiconductor film. In another application of the process, a target composed of a semiconductor alloy is used with separate sputtering and passivating ion beams directed at the target to deposit a passivated compound semiconductor film. In still another application, one pair of two pairs of sputtering and passivating ion beams are employed to sputter each of two separate elemental semiconductor targets and to deposit a passivated compound semiconductor film. Films deposited according to the invention may be doped and junction structures formed in them during deposition by adding ions of a gaseous dopant to the beam or beams of passivating ions.

Dual ion beam deposition of amorphous semiconductor films

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Shaker Heights, OH, United States of America

John R Miller