These crystal growths appear finger-like in nature and contribute to the reason why high-energy batteries fail. Dendrites are serious business because they can cause short circuits and even fires. With these hi-res images, scientists aim to better understand the inner workings of batteries to the most fundamental level and hopefully create better batteries. These images were taken by a team of scientists at Stanford University using this Nobel Prize winning technique which consists of a flash-freezing process followed by slicing and then imaging. With TEM, the batteries were prepared for investigation in air which caused corrosion of the lithium.

Source: Forbes October 29, 2017 17:26 UTC