Two UT Arlington engineering faculty members have won a $152,077 Office of Naval Research grant to study the thermal properties of lithium-ion batteries and devise better designs for cooling and operating them safely on Navy ships and planes.

David Wetz, electrical engineering assistant professor, and Ankur Jain, aerospace and mechanical engineeringassistant professor, are working collaboratively on the research effort.

Ankur Jain, left, and David Wetz received an Office of Naval Research grant to study lithium-ion batteries.

"These batteries can get extremely hot especially when used at high current rates like the Navy plans to do in high continuous and pulsed power applications. That heat can cause the battery to age more quickly," Wetz said. "We need to understand how to predict the batteries' temperature rise and safely cool them to maintain both the batteries' lives and safety."

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