High-current Zinc-air Microbattery Based on a Micromachined Multilayer Lateral Metallic Scaffold

We present a three-dimensional zinc-air microbattery with improved discharge rate and reduced internal resistance. The device is based on a multilayer, micron-scale, high surface area metallic scaffold ‘skeleton’. This scaffold consists of alternating copper and nickel layers supporting zinc as electrodeposited anode material. A proof-of-concept zinc-air microbattery based on this technology was developed, characterized, and compared with commercially available zinc-air batteries. A single layer initial structure with a surface area of 0.9 mm 2 has been improved to a scaffold structure with 10 layers having a surface area of 10 mm 2 . The areal energy density of the microbattery was measured as 1.5~3 mWh/cm 2 under discharging through resistances ranging from 540 to 5000 Ω.