Battery Made from Natural Materials Could Replace Conventional Lithium-Ion Batteries

­What if your next battery could be made from the same kinds of ingredients found in your body? That’s the idea behind a breakthrough battery material made from natural, biodegradable components. It’s so natural, it could even be consumed as food.

A team of researchers at Texas A&M University, including Distinguished Professor of Chemistry Dr. Karen Wooley and Professor of Chemical Engineering Dr. Jodie Lutkenhaus, published its findings in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 

Wooley’s research group in the College of Arts and Sciences has spent the past 15 years shifting toward natural products for the construction of sustainable and degradable plastics materials. Lutkenhaus, associate dean for research in the College of Engineering, has been working on organic battery materials for the purposes of light weighting, flexibility and safety. She suggested collaboration to combine Wooley’s naturally-sourced polymers with her battery expertise.

“We’ve long been interested in safer, more flexible battery materials,” said Lutkenhaus. “When Dr. Wooley’s lab began developing these naturally-sourced polymers, it opened the door to something entirely new — a battery that could perform well and also disappear safely when it’s no longer needed.”

A battery made from vitamin B2 and amino acids

The new material is made from two key ingredients found in nature: riboflavin, also known as vitamin B2, and L-glutamic acid, an amino acid that helps build proteins in the body. 

“Those components were identified by a talented recent Ph.D. graduate Dr. Shih-Guo Li, who began his dissertation research five years ago with the intention of enhancing the content of bio-renewable building blocks for organic polymer battery construction,” Wooley said. “He then developed synthetic methods to connect the molecular building blocks into chain-like structures called polypeptides.”

What makes this material special is that it’s redox-active, which means it can gain and lose electrons. This is how batteries store and release energy. In this case, the riboflavin handles the energy, while the polypeptide provides structure and helps the material break down naturally.

Unlike conventional lithium-ion batteries, which rely on metals and petrochemicals, this new material is derived entirely from renewable biological sources. It’s designed to degrade safely when exposed to water or enzymes, making it a promising solution for reducing battery waste, especially in cases where batteries aren’t properly recycled.

“Although there are significant efforts to recycle batteries, in cases where batteries are not actively collected and processed for recycling, they should be capable of undergoing breakdown naturally and with release of non-toxic degradation products,” Wooley said.

Safer for the environment and living cells

In lab tests, the material showed its suitability as an anode, the part of a battery that stores electrons. Importantly, the material was also shown to be non-toxic to fibroblast cells, a type of cell found in connective tissue.

“At this point, we’ve merely confirmed that our materials are cytocompatible, meaning they are non-harmful to cells,” said Wooley. “This may matter if the materials were to be used in implantable or wearable devices.”

Lutkenhaus said the performance results were especially promising given the material’s natural origins.

“We were excited to see that the electrochemical behavior was on par with synthetic non-sustainable polymeric materials,” she said. “It shows that you don’t have to sacrifice performance to gain sustainability.”

Toward a circular future for battery design

The researchers say this kind of design — starting with the end in mind — is key to building a more sustainable future. Instead of creating materials that last forever and become waste, they’re designing them to be part of a circular economy, where materials are reused, recycled or safely returned to nature.

“I like to consider every synthetic material that my laboratory produces as being a point along its journey toward function and purpose,” Wooley said, “with an ability to perform physical and chemical transformations that allow reuse of the molecular components in several other directions. 

“Most extreme in this case, the batteries could become edible to provide a different kind of ‘energy’ supply.” 

For now, the team is focused on improving the material’s performance and finding ways to make it more affordable. Currently, the chemical process used to make the material is too expensive for commercial use.

 “We need to improve performance and then develop processes that would be profitable,” Wooley said. “That could require 5-10 years.”

The excitement of interdisciplinary collaboration

One of the most exciting parts of the project, the researchers say, was the collaboration across Texas A&M colleges. 

“As a chemist, my most exciting moment was when Professor Lutkenhaus’ laboratory demonstrated that our materials could be fabricated into working battery systems,” Wooley said. “It was a confirmation that the strategy has promise to move forward.”

Lutkenhaus added, “Seeing the materials come together in a functioning battery was a major milestone. It validated the concept and gave us a clear direction for future development.”

This research is supported by the National Science Foundation and the Welch Foundation.