Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis,

Lithium ion batteries (LIBs) have already been employed in electric or plug-in hybrid electric vehicles such as Nissan Leaf and Chevy Volt. However, the energy density of LIBs is not high enough to support long distance commute. The LIBs used for Nissan Leaf and Chevy Volt only can support 50 – 100 miles per charge. To successfully implement the LIB technology in electric vehicles, further improvements in energy density are required. Present-day batteries have only ~50 % of their volume occupied by the active materials. To increase the energy density of LIBs, new materials and processing technologies that can increase the fraction are of great interest. However, higher fraction of active materials in LIB electrodes could change electrodes ’ structural properties significantly, which could affect th