On September 17, 2021, ProtheSense Technology and Professor Lu Languang, the main person in charge of the intelligent battery sensor research team of Academician Ouyang Minggao, a power battery expert from Tsinghua University, and the main members of the team fully exchanged views on the application of TacSense Technology's TAS thin film sensor in power battery safety.

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First of all, Professor Lu Languang fully elaborated on the pain points of the current safety monitoring of the power battery industry. With the general idea of online monitoring of battery expansion, the Tsinghua team is looking for "tactile skin" technical support for the next generation of smart batteries, and further studies the integration of BMS battery management system, so as to improve the feasibility of the overall solution and accelerate the implementation of the industry. Professor Lu said that at present, it is still far from enough to monitor the safety and health status of power batteries through voltage, gas, temperature, potential and other dimensions, and there is still a huge gap in the analysis of failure factors of power battery fires in the electric vehicle industry, which is a broad space for new sensors to play their value. At the same time, multiple sets of experimental data of the research group show that there is a strong correlation between battery expansion force and battery safety. For example, the research group accelerates the aging of the power battery through cyclic charging and discharging, and intervenes in the monitoring of the expansion force of the whole life cycle of the battery through the TAS sensor of TacSense in this process, which can effectively judge the aging degree of the battery and infer the internal lithium separation state, and then carry out safety warning through the force dimension before the battery fails or causes safety risks, and then ensure that the electric vehicle algorithm can warn the battery explosion and fire risk earlier, so as to protect the life safety of users. Therefore, it is very necessary to monitor battery safety in real time from the force dimension, and once this monitoring method is realized, it will represent an echelon of battery safety early warning and protection ability upgrades, which is of great significance to the safety needs of the battery industry. In addition, further big data research based on the force dimension will also provide new data dimensions for the BMS algorithm, such as the real-time adjustment of the charging current according to the expansion force during the fast charging process, so as to improve the charging efficiency while ensuring battery safety and protecting battery life.

Lu Yao, a member of the Ouyang Academician team of Tsinghua University, gave a detailed explanation of its current scientific research direction, online monitoring expansion force scheme, EU BMS scheme and industry situation; It is introduced that the EU battery route and the joint research project carried out by the research group have preliminarily proved the effectiveness of early warning of online monitoring in battery safety management.

Fig.1 Relationship between pressure and battery performance curve (picture from Tsinghua University)

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Wang Xiaoyang, CEO of TacSense Technology, first introduced the entrepreneurial background of TacSense Technology's returnee scientists and Tsinghua alumni, as well as the original intention of solving the "bottleneck technology" for the country from the whole chain of independent patented technology and realizing the empowerment of tactile AI in intelligent manufacturing. Furthermore, TacSense Technology introduced in detail the existing products and solutions for the expansion force test in the power battery industry, and focused on sharing the industrial experience of TacSense in power batteries.
Wang Xiaoyang said that TacSense has now been deeply involved in the force dimension monitoring of the entire power battery industry chain, including battery cell manufacturers, vehicle manufacturers, testing institutions and universities, and has accumulated rich experience in application scenarios and production and testing data. Such a data foundation is a very necessary prerequisite for cooperating with Tsinghua University to monitor the swelling force in real time, and can efficiently provide solutions based on actual scenarios. In response to the cost factor mentioned by the Tsinghua team, Wang Xiaoyang said that TacSense, as a provider of fully independent intellectual property rights and a full-chain solution provider, coupled with the mass production capacity of consumer electronics, will have the ability to achieve ultra-cost-effective real-time monitoring of intelligent batteries and escort tens of millions of electric vehicle users.

Figure 2 Tsinghua University and TacSense Technology discuss the power battery, expansion force and safety of automobiles

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The two parties also brainstormed on the spot about the common cell models on the market, discussing where the thin-film sensor may be loaded and how to connect the wiring with the BMS chip. At the scene, experts from BAIC Group were invited to put forward valuable opinions on the pressure distribution detection solution and real-time monitoring solution of intelligent cells. Solution experts from China Mobile Integration also shared the market demand for remote monitoring and management of electric vehicles and energy storage industry from the Ministry of Emergency Response of the People's Republic of China and national energy enterprises, and expressed their willingness to cooperate with TacSense to open up "sensing" to "communication" and "platform intelligence" in the future.
 

Figure 3 Tsinghua University and TacSense Technology brainstormed on the pressure detection point of power battery cells

The parties agreed that after the eleventh day, they will discuss the roadmap of TacSense haptic sensors "on the car", in order to empower the power battery industry as soon as possible, and will discuss the selection of OEMs and their supporting battery cell suppliers to carry out pre-research projects, and realize the smart skin tactile upgrade of small batches of battery cells by the end of the year.

Tsinghua University expert group introduced

Lu Languang, Professor, Senior Engineer. Tsinghua University power battery expert Ouyang Minggao research group intelligent sensor project team leader; One of the Chinese leaders of the battery direction of the Sino-US clean energy international cooperation project; One of the project leaders of the Tsinghua-Toyota Joint Research Fund "Research on Key Technologies of Smart Batteries Based on Smart Materials and Advanced Sensing"; He has published more than 100 academic papers in core journals, 66 of which are included in SCI, and 5 highly cited ESI papers. 83 national patents have been obtained; 5 provincial and ministerial science and technology awards; Won the first prize of China Automobile Industry Technology Invention Award in 2016.

Introduction of TacSense Technology

TacSense Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. (TacSense) has developed and owns the world's most sensitive and flexible tactile sensing technology - Flexible Ionized Sensing Technology (FITS), which can provide real-time, high-quality, low-noise haptic/pressure signals, and has physical characteristics such as full flexibility, optical transparency and ultra-thin packaging, with full independent intellectual property rights and full chain advantages, and is committed to solving the pain points of pressure sensitivity and pressure distribution needs in various industries such as industry, consumer electronics, health, and medical care.