Studies done at the Canadian Light Source on the University of Saskatchewan campus are pointing the way to lithium batteries that will last longer in things like electric cars and cell phones.

Researcher Andy Sun says black phosphorene is about 7 times more powerful than the materials currently used in lithium-ion batteries. The problem is, it costs about $1,000 per gram, so they wanted to find a way to synthesize it to make it cheaper, which they were able to do, with help from the beamlines at the CLS.

Sun says they developed phosphorene that is 300 times less than the original cost, which he considers a big improvement and will help and energy and electronic-related fields.
Next on the list, is finding ways to keep the black phosphorene from degrading, which is another project that is utilizing the beamlines at the CLS.

This research will help to increase the capacity of lithium batteries about 7 times, which means an electric car being able to go further, or a longer charge on your cell phone.