Recent Advances on Boosting the Cell Voltage of Aqueous Supercapacitors

Due to its ultra-fast charge/discharge rate,long cyclic life span,and environmental benignity,aqueous supercapacitor(SC)is considered as a proper nextgeneration energy storage device.Unfortunately,limited by undesirable water electrolysis and unreasonable electrode potential range,aqueous SC normally generates a narrow cell voltage,resulting in a low energy density.To address such challenge,enormous efforts have been made to construct high-voltage aqueous SCs.Despite these achievements,the systematic reviews about this field are still rare.To fill this knowledge gap,this review summarizes the recent advances about boosting the cell voltage of aqueous SCs.From the viewpoint of electrode,doping alkali cations,modulating the electrode mass ratio,and optimizing the surface charge density are regarded as three effective pathways to achieve this goal.However,adjusting the appropriate pH level,introducing redox mediators,and constructing“water-in-salt”electrolyte are other three universal routes from the electrolyte aspect.Furthermore,it is also effective to obtain the high-voltage aqueous SCs through asymmetric design,such as designing asymmetric SCs.The confronting challenges and future development tendency towards the high-voltage aqueous SCs are further discussed.

Rechargeable Na-MnO_(2) battery with modified cell chemistry

High voltage,high energy density,nominal cycle life,and low cost are the most critical requirements of rechargeable batteries for their widespread energy storage applications in electric vehicles and renewable energy technologies.Na-MnO_(2) battery could be a low-cost contender,but it suffers extensively from its low cell voltage and poor rechargeability.In this study,we modified the conventional cell structure of Na-MnO_(2) battery and established altered cell chemistry through a hybrid electrochemical process consisting of Na striping/plating at the anode and Zn^(2+) insertion/de-insertion along with MnO_(2) dissolution/deposition at the cathode.After the modification,Na-MnO_(2) battery exhibits a discharge capacity of 267.10 mA h/g and a cell voltage of 3.30 V(vs.Na/Na^(+)),resulting in a high specific energy density of 881.43 Wh/kg.After 300 cycles,the battery retains 98% of its first-cycle discharge capacity with100% coulombic efficiency.Besides,Na metal-free battery assembled using sodium biphenyl as a safer anode also delivers an excellent energy density of 810.0 Wh/kg.This work could provide a feasible method to develop an advanced Na-MnO_(2) battery for real-time energy storage applications.

Improvement of the Open Circuit Voltage of CZTSe Thin-Film Solar Cells by Surface Sulfurization Using SnS

The objective of this study is to find an effective method to improve Voc without Jsc loss for Cu2ZnSnSe4 （CZTSe） thin film solar cells, which have been fabricated by the one step co-evaporation technique. Surface sulfurization of CZTSe thin films is carried out by using one technique that does not utilize toxic H2S gas; a sequential evaporation of SnS after CZTSe deposition and the annealing of CZTSe thin films in selenium vapor. A Cu2ZnSn（S, Se）4 （CZTSSe） thin layer is grown on the surface of the CZTSe thin film after the annealing. The conversion efficiency of the completed device is improved due to the enhancement of Voc, which could be attributed to the formation of a hole-recombination barrier at the surface or the passivation of the surface and grain boundary by S incorporation.

Proposal of High Gain, Reduced Stress with Low-Duty-Cycle Two-Input Boost Converter for Renewable Energy Systems

A two-input boost converter with voltage multiplier cell is proposed in this paper. Then a family of two-input converters with and without voltage multiplier cell are derived and their results are compared to achieve high voltage gain, low duty cycle, and reduced voltage stress. From the analysis of different topologies, a modified two-input converter with two-stage voltage multiplier cell has good operating characteristics. The switch voltage stress and duty cycle of the modified converter is significantly very less than that of the other converter topologies. The modified DC-DC converter with 50% duty cycle achieves a voltage gain of 10 and the results are verified by using MATLAB/Simulink software.

A non-aqueous Li/organosulfur semi-solid flow battery

Non-aqueous flow batteries have attracted extensive attention due to the advantages of wide voltagewindow, high energy density and wide operating temperature and so on. Herein, tetramethylthiuramdisulfide （TMTD） with high intrinsic capacity （223 mAh/g） and high solubility （-1 mol/L in chloroform） isinvestigated as the positive active material of the non-aqueous LiJdisulfide semi-solid flow battery. Theelectrochemical activity and reversibility are investigated by cyclic voltammetry and linear scanvoltammetry. This Li/TMTD battery with a high cell voltage of 3.36 V achieves coulombic efficiency of 99%,voltage efficiency of 73% and energy efficiency of 72% at the current density of 5 mA/cm2 with activematerial concentration of 0.1 mol/L. Moreover, the LiJTMTD battery can operate for 100 cycles withoutobvious efficiency decay, indicating good stability.

Experimental research on the relationship between bypass diode configuration of photovoltaic module and hot spot generation

A hot spot is a reliability problem in photovoltaic(PV) modules where a mismatched or shaded cell heats up significantly and degrades the PV module output power performance. High PV cell temperature due to a hot spot can damage the cell encapsulate and lead to second breakdown, which both cause permanent damage to the PV module. In present systems, bypass diodes are used to mitigate the hot spot problem. In this work, five commercial polysilicon P V modules configured with different numbers of bypass diodes are used to study the influence of bypass diodes on the reverse bias voltage of a shaded cell and the resulting hot spot phenomenon. The reverse bias voltage of the shaded cell, and the hot spot probability and severity decrease as the number of bypass diodes increases. Negative terminal voltage of a shaded cell accompanied by a switched-off bypass diode are the necessary condition for hot spot generation. In an extreme case where each cell has an individual bypass diode in a P V module, it still cannot avoid the hazards of a hot spot under the shading areas of 5-7 cm2, but the probability of a hot spot is reduced to a minimum of 0.41%.