Using strands of vitamin B2, which have been produced using genetically modified fungi, researchers from the University of Toronto have developed a battery with high capacity and high voltage, which can pave the way for environmentally friendly batteries, without the use of metals.

Stated researchers results are comparable to existing high-energy lithium ion batteries with a capacity of about 125 mAh and a voltage of 2.5 V. The developed battery uses flavin derived from vitamin B2, as the cathode material instead of the battery based on lithium.

“We’ve been looking for a clue to the nature surrounding us, until finally not found complex molecules for use in a variety of consumer electronics applications,” said Dwight Seferos (Dwight Seferos), Associate Professor of the Faculty of Chemistry at the University. “When you take something already complex, made in nature, you will ultimately spend less time to produce the new material.”

While other studies such as the study of the flow of the electrolyzer from Harvard University, including vitamin B2 as a battery component, researchers from the University of Toronto argue that their modification is the first that uses a long-chain polymer molecules produced by biological means, to one of the electrodes , thereby accumulating energy in the plastic created from vitamins, not metals, which are more expensive, difficult to handle and potentially more toxic to the environment.

Examining various long chain polymers – in particular side group polymers which are a group of molecules of attached to the “backbone” of the long chain molecules – chemists new cathode material created by combining two units flavin and long-chain molecules “backbone.”

“Organic chemistry – it is something like a Lego», Seferos said. “You put the items together in a certain order, but some of them, that seem to be well suited to each other on paper, did not fit the reality. We tried several times to find a solution, and only five have succeeded. ”

Vitamin B2 inherent ability to store energy in our bodies from the decay of food also means that it easily reacts, and this makes it ideal for use in batteries.

«B2 may take up to two electrons at the same time,” said Seferos. “This gives him the ability to easily transfer multiple charges and provide high capacity compared with many other available molecules.”

“There was a lot of trial and error,” he added. “Now we are looking for new options for the material, which can be recharged several times.”

Although the prototype has a size of approximately comparable to a conventional hearing aid battery, the researchers hope that their new device could pave the way to the batteries do not contain metals that are more energy efficient, thin, and with greater flexibility than is available today. The Group also believes that one day, using a technique developed by them with flavin can be created crystal clear version of the battery.