UCSD professor devises way to recycle lithium-ion batteries

First author Yang Shi, left, and Professor Zheng Chen of UC San Diego developed a method to recycle and regenerate cathodes of spent lithium ion batteries. (UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering)

SAN DIEGO: The promise of a global electric vehicle transformation has a looming problem. 

The cathodes in the lithium-ion batteries typically used in electric vehicles, or EVs, are made of metal oxides that contain cobalt, a metal found in finite supplies and concentrated in one of the globe's more precarious countries.