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Nobel-winning lithium battery inventor John Goodenough dies at 100
by AFP Workers Writers
Washington (AFP) June 27, 2023
John Goodenough, who shared the 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for growing the lithium-ion battery that revolutionized fashionable life, has died on the age of 100, the College of Texas introduced.
Goodenough died on Sunday, stated the college, the place he labored as an engineering professor.
The US scientist’s contributions to the event of lithium-ion batteries paved the best way for smartphones and a fossil fuel-free society.
“John’s legacy as an excellent scientist is immeasurable — his discoveries improved the lives of billions of individuals world wide,” Jay Hartzell, president of the College of Texas at Austin, stated within the assertion.
“He was a pacesetter on the chopping fringe of scientific analysis all through the various a long time of his profession.”
In 1986, on the age of 64, Goodenough joined the College of Texas the place he served as a school member within the Cockrell Faculty of Engineering for 37 years.
“The world has misplaced an unbelievable thoughts and beneficiant spirit. He will likely be really missed among the many scientific and engineering neighborhood, however he leaves a long-lasting legacy that can encourage generations of future innovators and researchers,” stated Sharon Wooden, provost of the College of Texas.
Goodenough turned the oldest particular person to win a Nobel Prize when on the age of 97 he shared the 2019 chemistry award with Britain’s Stanley Whittingham and Akira Yoshino of Japan for the invention of the lithium-ion battery.
In search of another supply of energy in the course of the oil disaster of the Nineteen Seventies, Whittingham found a method to harness the potential vitality in lithium, a metallic so mild it floats on water.
Nevertheless, the battery he constructed was too unstable for use.
Goodenough constructed on Whittingham’s prototype, substituting a distinct metallic compound and doubling the potential vitality of the battery to 4 volts.
This paved the best way for a lot extra highly effective and sturdy batteries sooner or later.
In 1985, Yoshino as a substitute used a carbon-based materials that shops lithium ions, lastly rendering the battery commercially viable.
The fruits of the trio’s analysis resulted in essentially the most highly effective, light-weight and rechargeable battery ever seen.
– ‘A chargeable world’ –
“They created a chargeable world,” the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which awarded the accolade, stated on the time.
“Lithium batteries have revolutionized our lives since they first entered the market in 1991,” and have been “of the best profit to humankind”.
Their work significantly boosted human mobility, and allowed tens of millions in growing international locations to entry info and providers on-line with only a cell phone.
Lithium-ion batteries have additionally lowered the reliance on planet-warming fossil fuels, particularly in electrical vehicles.
On receiving information of his Nobel, Goodenough expressed pleasure within the worldwide influence of his work.
“I am extraordinarily comfortable that my discovery has been in a position to assist communication by way of the world,” he stated.
“We have to construct relationships, not wars. I’m comfortable if individuals use this for good, not evil.”
Born in 1922 in Germany, Goodenough grew up in the USA and earned a bachelor’s diploma in arithmetic from Yale College.
After serving as a meteorologist within the US Military throughout World Struggle II, Goodenough earned a grasp’s diploma and a PhD in physics on the College of Chicago in 1952, in keeping with the College of Texas assertion.
From 1952, he labored on the Massachusetts Institute of Expertise’s Lincoln Laboratory for twenty-four years and laid the groundwork for the event of pc random-access reminiscence (RAM).
Goodenough was head of the inorganic chemistry laboratory at Oxford College when he made his lithium-ion battery discovery.
In 1986, he joined the College of Texas the place he was identified for his “fast wit and infectious chortle.”
He was nonetheless coming into work properly into his 90s, the college stated.
Goodenough and his spouse Irene have been married for 70 years, till her loss of life in 2016.
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