All-Direct Laser Patterning Zinc-Based Microbatteries

Miniature batteries with programmable shape and scalable functions can provide new opportunities in the design of highly compatible integrated circuits and flexible microelectronics. However, achieving these energy supply devices requires the precise formation of highly active electrode materials in a high-resolution patterned area using appropriate construction protocols. Here, shape-customizable zinc-based microbatteries (MBs) using an all-direct laser patterning (DLP) technique is demonstrated. Unlike conventional processing approaches, the DLP with high spatial-resolution can not only enable template-free and efficient arbitrary customizable fabrication of geometry patterns, such as circular, papercut, tropical fish, house shapes, among others, but also spontaneously create oxygen vacancies within micro-electrode materials that are beneficial to increasing electrochemical active sites. The resultant Zn//MnO₂ MBs deliver a high areal capacity of 0.57 mAh cm⁻² and an energy density of 0.75 mWh cm⁻², surpassing most available aqueous Zn-based MBs and Li/Na-based MBs. This strategy can also be extended to other battery systems, such as Zn//Co and Zn//Ag MBs. More importantly, these micro-batteries are easily integrated into on-chip electronic systems as built-in power supply to be highly compatible with multiple sensing functionalities, which showcase accurately monitoring wrist bending, pulse beating, temperature, and moisture signals in humans.