On the other side, Jinling, Chuanhai Materials Research Institute.

Xu Chuan is still learning about the research ideas and directions of lithium-sulfur batteries with master Xiong Fan Pengyue and the Argonne National Laboratory, and discussing solutions.

Suddenly, when I heard that the patent application for the lithium-sulfur battery and the patent application for 'monoclinic gamma phase sulfur' patented by the Chuanhai Materials Research Institute was rejected, the whole person was stunned for a moment.

Not only him, but also Fan Pengyue and Cao Yiran were also stunned.

I knew that the country on the other side of the Pacific was shameless, but I didn't expect it to be so shameless.

The rejection has been preliminarily examined, and the patent application with the patent number has been obtained, which is an extremely rare thing in international patent applications.

After all, generally speaking, being able to get a patent number means that the preliminary review work, from the subject to the technology, to the public order and morality, the form of the document and other aspects have been completed, and there is no problem.

In this case, the other party rejected their patent application, and their selfish intentions almost did not directly and publicly say that they did not want you to pass.

Although under normal circumstances, a patent application can be reexamined after it has been refused, and the patent office must also accept the reexamination application.

But obviously, even if they submit a review, the other party will basically choose to get stuck directly, or delay the time indefinitely.

On the sofa, after hearing the news, Master Xiong Fan Pengyue had a trace of bitterness on his face, and said helplessly: "This is a clear target." ”

On the other side, Xu Chuan shook his head lightly and said, "It's okay, the patent application is just one way, the big deal is to withdraw all the patents when the time comes, and cooperate with domestic manufacturers to produce lithium-sulfur batteries." ”

As for the fact that the patent grant application was being targeted, he did not have much opinion.

Since the 21st century has entered the stage of rapid development, have there been few policies on the other side of the strait for domestic enterprises?

It is not a matter of one or two days for Chuanhai Materials Research Institute to enter the target list.

As early as a few years ago, when artificial SEI films were developed, they came into each other's sight.

It's just that there are not many projects or technologies developed by Chuanhai Materials Research Institute.

What they export to the outside world is either artificial SEI thin film patent licensing, or high-temperature copper-carbon-silver composite superconducting materials, which can be said to be almost irreplaceable, or some other technologies that cannot be critical.

It is difficult for them to target the former, after all, local enterprises also need authorization and materials.

As soon as the artificial SEI film authorization is broken, battery companies will be extremely uncomfortable, which can be said to be irreplaceable in the current lithium-ion battery. Although there are spare items, if they are replaced, they will cause a series of problems such as the recurrence of lithium dendrites, which in turn will reduce the battery capacity.

Not to mention the latter, the large-scale controllable nuclear fusion reactors being built on several continents in the United States still rely on high-temperature copper-carbon-silver superconducting materials.

Without this thing, their controlled fusion reactor would have to stop.

As for some other materials or technologies, most of them are irrelevant and meaningless.

Therefore, although the Chuanhai Materials Research Institute has entered the field of vision of Lao Mi Business for a long time, there is no good way to resist.

R&D companies are like that, and it's hard to target.

Of course, the more important thing is that Chuanhai Materials Research Institute is not like Warwick, SMIC, aerospace and other enterprises, while needing the United States and the world market, it also relies on the import of chips, engines and other technologies.

While it has no desire and does not need rice products, it also controls a number of irreplaceable products and technologies.

Therefore, for Lao Mi, the Chuanhai Materials Research Institute is like a fish bone in the throat, which makes them quite uncomfortable.

This time, I finally found a 'legitimate' reason, and it was not their style if they didn't make some moves.

On the other side of the sofa, Master Xiong Fan Pengyue frowned and said, "The rejection of the patent grant application is not a serious matter, what I am worried about is the research situation at the Argonne National Laboratory. ”

After a slight pause, he looked at Xu Chuan and Cao Yiran with concern on his face and continued: "We have all read the news of the Chicago newspaper, and judging from the information revealed in the newspaper news, the progress of Argonne National Laboratory in the field of lithium-sulfur batteries is probably not low. ”

"The route they took was also the direction of 'monoclinic gamma sulfur' that we studied, and even the material that stabilized the 'monoclinic gamma sulfur' was carbon material."

"My concern is that they may soon follow up in this field and complete the research and development of lithium-sulfur batteries."

"In this way, with the influence of the patent office, it may not be possible to get the patent authorization before us."

After speaking, Fan Pengyue took a deep breath, and then added: "It's not even clear that our patent application was rejected this time, because it was for this aspect." ”

"They want to hold down our patents, and then accelerate the research at Argonne National Laboratories and preemptively file for them!"

Since graduating with a Ph.D., he took over the Chuanhai Institute of Materials, and with the support of Xu Chuan, the institute has stood at the top of the country from the very beginning.

Therefore, he also came into contact with many laboratories and research institutes in the same industry and field, and learned a lot about the stories of this industry, or shady scenes.

Hearing this, Xu Chuan and Cao Yiran were stunned for a moment.

The latter opened his mouth wide, and his round face, which was already slightly chubby, directly turned into a big O-shape, and he said in a daze: "No, no, right?" Can you do such a disgusting thing... ”

Compared with Fan Pengyue and Xu Chuan, as a scientific researcher, he has much less contact with things, and he is more simple when he deals with experimental scientific research every day.

Xu Chuan also frowned and said: "Needless to say, the importance of lithium-sulfur batteries is needless to say, if they can be controlled in the field of lithium batteries, they can't do this kind of thing." ”

"If Argonne National Laboratory succeeds in taking a different route to complete the lithium-sulfur battery, this is really not good news for us."

"I'm afraid that when the time comes, not only will there be some nonsense, but it will also be difficult for our lithium-sulfur batteries to go abroad."

The idea put forward by the master Xiong Fan Pengyue is indeed very possible in his opinion. Because today, when electrical energy has been liberated, the importance of batteries is far higher than before.

Not only daily necessities such as mobile phones and computers, but also automobiles, military industry, aerospace and other fields are related to it.

After the completion of artificial SEI film technology, they were originally at the forefront of the development in this field. Not only that, artificial SEI thin film technology has also affected the country's deployment in the field of new energy.

Once they lose in the battery field, even if they and the other party jointly control the lithium-sulfur battery technology, it is not good news.

Because when the time comes, it will not only affect the interests of Chuanhai Materials Research Institute, but also the country's deployment in this field.

With a long sigh of relief, Xu Chuan came back to his senses from his thoughts, looked at the two people sitting opposite the sofa, and said, "Senior Brother Fan, Cao Gong, stop the matter of lithium-sulfur battery patents for the time being, and now there is one thing that you need to do first." ”

The expressions on Fan Pengyue and Cao Yiran's faces froze, waiting for the arrangement.

Xu Chuan thought for a moment and continued: "If I remember correctly, in the Chicago Tribune news, Argonne National Laboratory took almost the same route in the direction of lithium-sulfur batteries as ours. ”

"It's just that they stabilized the 'monoclinic gamma sulfur' using carbon nanotubes and other carbon materials."

"I need you to put down your other experiments first, and conduct more experiments and tests on the stability of 'monoclinic gamma sulfur' through chemical material calculation models and artificial experiments, so as to fully understand whether other carbon nanomaterials have the same effect and performance as graphite defect lattice."

"Determine if there are other carbon nanomaterials that can replace the pentagonal graphite lattice."

Fan Pengyue nodded and said, "This is no problem, I can arrange it immediately." ”

On the side, Cao Yiran on the sofa also nodded and agreed: "I will cooperate throughout the process." ”

"Well, let's do it first."

Xu Chuan answered, stood up and prepared to find Wen Yuanhang.

He can't interrupt the research of Argonne National Laboratory, but according to Fan Pengyue's master Xiong's speculation, the impact of this matter is not only the patent of him and the Chuanhai Institute of Materials, but also very likely to have a significant impact on the country's layout in the field of new energy.

This matter has to be reported.

Shaking his head slightly, Xu Chuan got up and left the office and rushed towards the Xinghai Research Institute.

If Argonne National Laboratory's lithium-sulfur battery is successfully developed, it may be a real problem for them.

After receiving the information provided by Xu Chuan, Wen Yuanhang quickly reported the relevant situation with a solemn face.

Judging from Fan Pengyue's speculation, this is no longer a dispute between the two research institutes and laboratories.

After a series of data and information were collected, it has to be said that this master bear's speculation is indeed quite accurate.

After the rejection of the international authorization application for the lithium-sulfur battery patent, the Institute for Energy and Global Security under the Argonne National Laboratory, led by Professor Theresa Achille, has made every effort to promote the lithium-sulfur battery project.

To speed up the research, they even invited Professor Stanley Whittingham, the 2019 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry.

The long-time British-British professor is currently the director of the Materials Institute and the Materials Science and Engineering program at the State University of New York and Binghamton University.

He won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 19 for his research on lithium-ion batteries. It can be said that lithium-ion batteries are widely used today, which is inseparable from the research of this old professor.

With the full participation of this well-known professor in chemistry and the laboratory, Professor Theresa Achill has advanced quite rapidly in the work of lithium-sulfur batteries and the stabilization of 'monoclinic gamma-phase sulfur'.

Through continuous experiments, they are constantly experimenting, trying to stabilize the crystallization properties of 'monoclinic gamma sulfur' through carbon materials.

This is the key point to solve the shuttle effect of lithium-sulfur batteries.

However, no matter how fast the Argonne National Laboratory is, it is not as fast as the Chuanhai Institute of Materials, which has relatively mature data.

With the support of the supercomputing center + chemical material calculation model built at a cost of more than 1.5 billion meters of gold, Fan Pengyue and Cao Yiran have conducted more than three digits of stability simulation experiments and artificial experiments on 'monoclinic gamma phase sulfur'.

From carbon nanotubes, to graphene, to fullerenes, straight-chain acetylene carbon and other allotropes of carbon, they have carried out a large number of simulation experiments and artificial reproducibility experiments.

According to the experimental data, although these carbon allotropes have a certain effect on stabilizing the crystallization of 'monoclinic gamma sulfur', it is difficult to catch up with the pentagonal defective graphite lattice materials specially treated with nitrogen and sodium materials.

There is an effect, but the effect is not strong.

This is the case of the stable crystallization of 'monoclinic gamma sulfur' in a lithium-sulfur battery by numerous carbon allotropes.

After learning this news, Xu Chuan also breathed a sigh of relief.

Judging from the current situation, Argonne National Laboratory wants to perfectly manufacture and 'reproduce' their lithium-sulfur battery technology in a short period of time, which is very difficult, if not impossible.

After all, the special treatment of graphite with nitrogen and sodium materials to form pentagonal defect carbon-sulfur composites is obtained through countless simulation experiments of chemical material calculation models.

If you want to go through this road of artificial experiments, although theoretically it is not impossible, this may be lower than buying two yuan of materials and winning a grand prize of five million.

Although in materials science, there is a discipline or field called 'reverse analysis engineering', which refers to the observation and analysis of 'material samples' through microscopic spectra to achieve the purpose of restoring the basic formula.

However, in fact, it is almost impossible to achieve perfect analysis, decipherment and reproduction of materials by current reverse analysis methods.

It's very simple, because to reorganize something, you must know all its information, otherwise the reorganized thing is still not the same, and it is not necessarily.

Especially at the molecular and atomic level, the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics shows that neither measurement nor operation can be 100% accurate.

That is, you want to measure all the information about the object, but you can only get part of the information in reality, and it's not accurate.

When you want to manipulate an atom and molecule to meet your preset conditions (such as putting it in a certain position), you can't do it accurately, and it's likely to be offset.

Because you don't know what kind of environment it is in, how high the temperature, how high the humidity is.

Therefore, it is very simple to reverse analyze and reorganize to a certain result, but it is almost impossible to reproduce it perfectly.

After all, if the reverse analysis is really so easy to complete, not to mention the rest, the high-temperature copper-carbon-silver composite superconducting materials he researched have long been everywhere.

Those Western countries are even less likely to spend a lot of money from him.

It's a very realistic thing.

Argonne National Laboratories is struggling to develop lithium-sulfur batteries in a short period of time, which is undoubtedly good news among the worst news.

If Argonne National Laboratory cannot develop lithium-sulfur batteries that are comparable to them in performance, Huaguo's next deployment in the field of new energy and batteries can even make a reasonable change and move in the direction of monopoly!

PS: There's another chapter later, but it shouldn't be after twelve o'clock.