Have you ever experienced your phone run out of charge and lost contact with your family and friends? It is quite stressful, right? What if our phone batteries could be charged in less than a minute? Well, there is a young girl who attempted to solve this problem. Do you want to know who is she? Eesha Khare, the inventor of “supercapacitor”, designed a super-fast and effective phone charger using her knowledge in nanochemistry. Her supercapacitor fits inside a mobile phone battery, transfers electricity, charges the device in up to 30 seconds, and survives 1000 charging cycles. It has a high energy density, high power density, and high cycle life.
The Life of Eesha Khare
Eesha Khare (born 1995) was an American student who worked to develop a supercapacitor prototype when she was 18. She graduated of Lynbrook High School in California was the runner up at Intel International Science and Engineering Fair held in Phoenix on May 17, 2013 where 1600 other finalists from more than 70 countries participated.
She lives in Saratoga, California. She was invited to speak on the talk show Conan on June 13, 2013. She is currently a student at the University of Cambridge and a graduate of Harvard University with a degree in Nanophysics.
The Story of Supercapacitor – her invention
The supercapacitor was introduced by Eesha Khare provides outstanding permanence with only 32.5% loss in capacity after 10,000 charge and discharge cycles. It offered a power density of 20,540 W per kg (rapidity of charge).
She designed, synthesized, and characterized a novel electrode nanorods with hydrogenated titanium dioxide nuclei (H-TiO2) and shells polyaniline (PAni) – a conductive polymer to improve the energy density of supercapacitor. The good conductivity of TiO2 hydrogenated combined with the pseudo-high capacity of the polyaniline gives a total capacity and a significantly high energy density while maintaining good power density and long life.
To perform the work, Khare had access to laboratory facilities of the University California Sta. Cruz under the supervision of Mr. Yat Li. It was small and flexible and has been used so far only to turn on the LED for testing purposes. Bulkier versions will in future operate electronic appliances and why not smartphones.
The young high school girl concluded that it is already planning a version of its supercapacitor to replace car batteries. Version reduced size; supercapacitors could also enjoy its finesse and its flexibility to be inserted directly into the flexible OLED screens that will soon hit the market, or in smart clothes which will then be powered by photo films.
Khare’s invention won $50,000 in prize money at the Intel Foundation Young Scientist Award held in Phoenix, Arizona. Afterwards, she got the attention of Google and other technological giants.
The significant why she created a supercapacitor is that she wants to create it and to recharge a smartphone in 20 seconds. It is quite exaggerated but she invented a sufficiently high performance supercapacitor to replace our Smartphone battery. The young girl shows that supercapacitors can move fast and that in the future they might advantageously replace some batteries.
There’s one more thing she wants to achieve:
“I think there’s a lot of stigma being a girl – being s woman in science – so I really wanted to break that in the world of science.”
Even a young people can create their invention, just like Eesha. She is very amazing. Young students all over the world can have the same opportunity to invent something like this, if they have the exposure to science and technology at a young age. Teaching the youth to be innovative can show promising futures for those students. This can help the world shape up and get more of the latest technology.
