[twoslide]

Really interesting to compare with the publication itself:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03757-z

They don't mention six times more charge anywhere. Rather, the novelty is that it they make a discharge reaction re-chargeable for the first time. The final paragraph hints at a rapid drop-off after the first discharge:

> The battery delivered about 3,309 mAh first discharge capacity and was cyclable at 500–1,200 mAh.

One can see a benefit in that a previous single-use battery could be cycled (e.g. a hearing aid). The press release claim is such a stretch as to be essentially a lie:

> a high-performance rechargeable battery that could enable cellphones to be charged only once a week instead of daily and electric vehicles that can travel six times farther

[rsfern]

I agree about the press release. Though they do run it out to ~100 cycles without too much apparent further degradation, so it’s probably not dead on arrival as a contender against Li-ion?

[twoslide]

That's a good point, although I am not sure whether the "six times" claim was based on the first cycle or the subsequent cycles (partly because the authors didn't make it themselves). Even if subsequent cycles are 1/3 as the first, that could still mean twice as much charge as li-ion.

[oliwarner]

But with materials you can extract from seawater (with the valuable by-product of potable water).

All other things being equal (unlikely to begin with), these would be furiously cheaper to make, and wrest production from China.

Even at half the performance of lithium, this would look tempting.

[thatguy0900]

Must be incredibly frustrating to be a researcher and see the media absolutely butcher things you worked on

[Someone1234]

"The media?" Isn't this a press release from their own University?

[serf]

there is usually a separate department that does that kind of release.

the author is listed as a 'Freelance editor and writer and content provider for Stanford University' on LinkedIn, assuming it's the right 'Andrew Meyers from Stanford'.[1]

[1]: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-myers-0275b47

[manquer]

The PR dept butcher is what you mean, this is a internal press release.

I won't necessarily assume that it was really a PR /media debacle, I have seen researchers encourage such reports for exposure / project funds etc.

After all we wouldn't really be discussing this if not the overblown title.