New Thermal Management Materials Make Batteries Safer Scientific Research Achievements Involved by Sanhua were Published in NATURE ENERGY for the First Time

Recently, Nature Energy, a top international journal of materials, published the latest research of Sanhua, the Department of Electronic Engineering, the Key Laboratory of Intelligent Green Vehicle and Mobility School, Tsinghua University and College of Chemical and Biological Engineering (CBE), Zhejiang University. This research is applied in the field of thermal safety management of new energy lithium batteries: “Rapid temperature-responsive thermal regulator for safety management of battery modules”. Among nine authors of the paper, Dr. Huang Hai, a material scientist of Sanhua, cowrite the paper as the fourth author, and he has made an important contribution to this achievement. This is also the first time that Sanhua’s scientific research achievements have been published in top international professional academic journals.

Up to now, Nature Energy is the journal with the highest impact factor in materials science research, reaching 56.7 from 2022 to 2023, ranking 1st in the major discipline, engineering technology, according to the latest upgraded version of JCR partition, Chinese Academy of Sciences SCI journals partition table.

As the world’s leading refrigeration household appliances and new energy automotive thermal management technology company, Sanhua attaches great importance to technology research and development, and actively builds a “production, education and research” platform. It has established and carried out good cooperation with many universities and research institutes at home and abroad, such as Tsinghua University, Xi’an Jiaotong University, National University of Singapore, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, South China University of Technology and Shanghai Jiaotong University.

At the beginning of 2020, Sanhua invited Professor Yang Ying of Tsinghua University to give an academic report and technical exchange, during which Sanhua researchers’ understanding of the development of industry technology and their grasp of application needs collided with Professor Yang’s cutting-edge research technology. The two sides decided to tackle the problems in the field of new energy thermal management materials. In the following months, Dr. Huang Hai, a material scientist of Sanhua, and Professor Yang Ying held extensive interdisciplinary technical discussions.

Dr. Huang Hai joined Sanhua in 2018 and was selected into the National Talent Introduction Program and has been engaged in material science research for a long time. His rich experience in many material branches and the accumulation of applied research in Sanhua have made the technical exchanges between Sanhua and Professor Yang Ying quite effective. Finally, the project focuses on one of the most concerned topics in the field of new energy, the thermal safety management of lithium batteries, and puts forward new material design ideas including graphene, phase change materials, polymer microspheres and other technologies. Dr. Huang used his expertise in phase change materials and polymer materials to judge the feasibility of the new technology route, which made an important contribution to the success of subsequent experiments.

In the same year, Professor Yang Ying’s team and Sanhua jointly applied for a major project of the National Natural Science Foundation in Zhejiang Province. From many strong competitive teams, the innovative design concept of Professor Yang Ying’s team, the strong platform support of Sanhua as a leading enterprise in the industry and the R & D strength of the joint team were recognized by the judges. The project was selected into the top five and got funding from the foundation.

The experimental research was carried out in Tsinghua University, during which the team has undergone hundreds of failures and attempts, and the battery explosion experiment was successfully completed in 2022. Professor Lu Jun of Zhejiang University, a famous scientist in the field of lithium battery research, joined the team, which made the understanding of the reaction mechanism of the new material system more thorough. The breakthrough of new materials has attracted the attention of the industry. This innovative material will bring great changes to new energy vehicles and energy storage thermal safety management.

The development and application of new thermal response materials provide an effective solution for the thermal management of high energy density batteries, which not only improves the safety and performance of batteries, but also has a profound impact on the thermal management industry. With the further popularization and application of this material, we believe that the thermal management of high energy density batteries will be solved, and the development of new energy vehicles and energy storage industry will step up to a new level. Through continuous technological innovation and progress, we will usher in the future of more secure, efficient and sustainable energy.