Of the many technical challenges constraining lithium-sulfur battery technology, the most difficult to solve was probably the Shuttle Effect.
The Shuttle Effect referred to how, during charging and discharging, polysulfide (Li₂Sₓ) intermediates produced at the cathode dissolved into the electrolyte, passed through the separator, diffused toward the anode, and ultimately came into direct contact with the metallic lithium there.
Back when he had been racing to crack lithium-sulfur battery technology and complete the patent layout before ExxonMobil, Lu Zhou, who could be said to bear the future of Hua Nation's new energy industry on his shoulders, had engaged in a long-distance contest with Professor Stanley, a leading figure in the lithium battery field.
At the time, with ExxonMobil's support, Professor Stanley had also resorted to an extremely disgraceful method. He bribed an assistant at the Sarot Institute under his name and stole the Caged Carbon Molecule model Lu Zhou had handed to Professor Sarot for research.
Still, it was fortunate that this farce had happened.
Not only had Professor Stanley gone further and further down the "wrong" path, but by sheer coincidence, he had also completed Lu Zhou's system mission of [Analyze the Carbon Nanospheres Beneath the Modified PDMS Film], raising his Materials Science level to LV4 and indirectly helping him break through a research bottleneck on the path toward Nobel Prize-level results...
Thinking about it, Lu Zhou felt rather ashamed. After all these years, he had never even called that generous old professor to thank him.
And at that very moment, the black powder inside the test tube in his hand was precisely the Caged Carbon Molecule researched by Professor Stanley—the Carbon Nanospheres discovered on Wreckage One.
Yang Xu: "This is..."
"A Caged Carbon Molecule used to transport oxygen molecules, though I prefer to call it a Carbon Nanosphere."