Lithium batteries show big promise as a versatile, dependable and resilient source of power. But one impediment to their performance are dendrites, spiky crystalline formations that can set batteries on fire. Fulton Schools Professor Hanqing Jiang is leading research on the use of silicone to prevent those dendrite formations. Jiang is finding that a process that causes the silicone to take on a pattern of wrinkles — giving it a three-dimensional, sponge-like form — is inhibiting dendrite growth. His lab team’s findings have been published in a recent issue of research journal Nature Energy.