Are Pollack batteries possible?

This posting was motivated by the claim of Donut Lab about a breakthrough in battery technology. February 2026, Donut Lab published one of a planned series of independent VTT test reports covering fast-charge performance only. All other claimed specifications — energy density (400 Wh/kg), cycle life (100,000 cycles), extreme-temperature tolerance, safety, and cost — remain entirely unverified by any independent party.

1. The claims of Donut LAB

What was announced was “Ultra high energy density, the fastest charging time, practically unlimited cycles, extreme safety, and lower price than lithium-ion”. The reactions from professional circles have been skeptical. It is indeed difficult to see how the claims about Donut batteries could be consistent with standard condensed matter physics.

1. The claim about very rapid charging time of about 5 minutes is verified in the VTT test. This corresponds to charging rate 11 C, where 1 C corresponds to a charging time of 1 hour.
2. It was found that there is a high heat production during charging. During VTT Test #6, the cell reached temperature of ≈ 90 ^_ºC under 11C charging with passive cooling only, triggering an automatic safety cutoff by the test equipment the cell itself showed no damage or signs of thermal runaway.
3. The number of life cycles is claimed to be extremely large, about 10⁵ cycle times and testing of so many cycles has been claimed to be implausible since it would require years. VTT made only 7 tests meaning 7 cycle times. The strong heating during the loading by ohmic currents is expected to cause damage to the electrode receiving the charge and this reduces the number of cycle times.
4. The claimed energy density of about 400 Wh/kg is very high. Suppose that the system consists of basic units with mass Am_p (m_p is proton mass) having atomic volume a₀³, where a₀= 10^-10 m. This would give an energy density of dE/dm= 1.4× 10^-10, where the unit c=1 is used. This would mean .1 eV per proton mass m_p≈ 10⁹ eV.

The energy density relates closely to the reported energy efficiency related to the counterpart of capacitor charge about 10⁵ Coulombs, which is very high but consistent with that for mobile phone batteries. Note that the energy density is proportional to the dielectric constant ε of a dielectric possibly used between the positively and negatively charged electrons. It measures how large fraction of energy is stored as chemical energy. For a simple capacitor the energy is mere electrostatic energy.

Donut battery is claimed to be a solid state battery cell. VTT did not verify the chemistry of the cell. The basic problem is what is called trilemma. In the framework of standard condensed matter physics, the conditions for high charging speed, large number of life cycles, and high energy density are mutually conflicting. The high charging rate, which has been verified, requires high energies so that the charging involves ohmic dissipation and large energy and momentum transfer to the electrode causing its deterioration. It is claimed that the momentum transfer during the charging is small.

This led to is a kind of private brain storming session about whether TGD based physics could allow the the realization of batteries based on TGD view of Pollack effect (see this, this, this, this). I am not specialized to battery technologies and these considerations are just speculations and need not have much to do with the Donut Lab battery, except as a thought ignition and framing the energy charging, storage, and dissipation systems. The basic inspiration comes from biological analogies and the charging of the battery is regarded as an analog of photosynthesis.

The notions of field/magnetic body, the hierarchy of effective Planck constants and Pollack effect are the key elements of the model and the following gives a brief summary of h_eff hierarchy and Pollack effect.

2. Could the notion of Pollack battery make sense?

I have considered the possibility that the Pollack effect plays a central role in electrolysis, which is the key effect in the chemistry of batteries. The following is an attempt to build a model for a battery based on the Pollack effect.

The claimed properties of the Donut battery can be used as guidelines in speculations. Something new making possible the rapid charging and the resolution of the trilemma and Pollack effect could be the missing element. I have discussed its generalization and possible applications to biology (see this and this) and also to develop some speculative ideas about living computers (see this and this).

1. The fast charging could be understood if the ions are generated by the Pollack effect or its generalization at the second electrode. Protons or perhaps even alkali ions could be generated by the generalized Pollack effect. In the presence of an electric field the positively charged ions would travel to the second electrode in the electric field (note that for static electric fields the voltage is the same along the space-time sheet for ordinary matter and for the magnetic flux tube).

Since the value of h_eff is large, dissipation would be small and could be even absent if the analog superconducting is in question. Therefore the travel time would be very short and could make rapid charging possible. In the simplest classical model the particle would experience the analog of free fall in the approximately constant gravitational field of Earth.

It is enough to get the positive ions to the opposite electrode. The positive electrode generates an opposing electric field E_opp causing a gradually increasing electric force. It is enough to have a gradually increasing electric field E, which exceeds this opposing electric field. The dark positive ions would experience the force Δ E= E-E_opp. This would save energy in charging and minimize the effects caused at the positive electrode. The positive ions could be transferred with minimal energy and momentum transfer to the positive electrode. Δ E could be much weaker than the electric field E_opp between the electrodes defining the voltage of the battery. This would minimize the damage to the electrode.

Where the positive dark ions would be generated by the Pollack effect. Could the Pollack effect occur at the electrode becoming negatively charged or in the counterpart of electrolyte between the electrodes? The recent finding reported in ScienceDaily (see this) that addition of water to a Sodium-Vanadium battery increases its charge capacity almost by a factor 2, suggests that the Pollack effect for water is in an essential role.

What is nice is that Sodium and Vanadium are not rare metals unlike Li. Researchers found that keeping water inside a key sodium-ion battery material nearly doubled its charge storage. It also charges faster and stays stable for hundreds of cycles. This discovery could make lithium obsolete. The same material can also desalinate seawater into drinking water.

This suggests that the Pollack effect generates negatively charged EZs in water. The first guess is that the negative charge is transferred to the negatively charged electrode by conduction in the electric field used for charging. If this occurs by ohmic conduction, a small value of Δ E would make the transfer slow. There is however evidence for the change of the arrow of time at the electric field body and this suggests large h_em (see this and this). If the negative ions are in large h_eff=h_em phase (proportional to the charge of the electrode), the transfer could occur without dissipation and be fast.

Also the huge dielectric constant ε (as large as 10⁶) strongly suggests that chemical energy storage dominates over electrostatic energy storage. This storage would naturally occur to the dielectric between the electrodes. The energy storage would be chemical as in biosystems and the electret would take the role of proteins and lipids. This suggests that the solid state dielectret should be organic material able to store metabolic energy. Carbon polymers carrying energy in carbon-carbon and carbon-hydrogen bonds is what suggests itself. In this case the use of the energy cannot lead to the catabolism producing CO₂ and water. The molecules must however experience a chemical change liberating energy. Double bonds (C=O)-(CH₃) groups are essential in the energy storage using proteins and lipids.

Very large charge for the capacitor-like system is required. A capacitor with parallel plates cannot realize this demand. The idea is that the standard capacitor is replaced with a very thin, highly folded bilayer, analogous to the pair of the lipid layers of a cell. These layers are insulated from each other by using a polymer so that dielectric breakdowns do not occur between the layers. There would also be electrolytes between the layers as electrodes.

If the bilayer is folded several times, the surface area increases so that the charge (and capacitance) can become very large. Interestingly, a also the cortex is also highly folded, which supports the idea that the surface area and the associated charge are maximized for both cells and cortex to increase the value of the total charge. This ensures maximum value of electric Planck constant h_em proportional to the total charge of the bilayer and serving as a universal IQ in TGD inspired theory of conscious experience.

The simplest Pollack battery would not involve the electrolyte and would store energy as electrostatic energy. The naive idea is that the addition of current wire between two electrodes makes it possible to use the energy of the capacitor. The addition of electrolyte is also possible.

Ohmic conductivity makes possible the transfer of currents in the electrolyte and the storage of energy as electric energy. Taking into account the contribution of the electric energy means the replacement of the electric energy CU²/2 with electric plus chemical energy ε_r CU²/2. For water the value is in the range 78-80. Doped semiconductors/polymers can have dielectric constant exceeding values 10⁶. This suggests that the dielectric storage of energy dominates overy the electrostatic storage. This would mean that the charging by Pollack effect should transfer energy to the electret requiring “dropping” of positive ions to the electret where they react chemically.

Does the presence of ohmic current create negative effects spoiling the nice features of Pollack battery? Should one require the dropping of the positively charged ions to the positive electrode or is the dropping to a possible electrolyte containing region between the electrodes desirable? Just for fun, one can make brave amateurish guesses about the actualization of the Pollack battery. Pollack effect is the new element.

1. The first guess would be the use of water for which Pollack effect certainly occurs. As alredy noticed, the addition of water to Sodium-Vanadium battery increases the charge storage capacity by a factor of almost 2 and also the charging becomes faster (see this).
2. One can also consider more exotic options. Could Carbon nanotubes (see this) serve an additional element of the Pollack battery besides electrodes and electrolyte? Carbon nanotube has an aromatic ring with six C atoms as a basic building block. Each C atom has a double bond with one of the neighboring 3 carbons associated with an aromatic ring.

It is known that -OH groups can be added to the defects (C=C is replaced with C-C) associated with the aromatic rings and the surface of Carbon nanotubes and they could could serve as seats of Pollack effect (see this). The Pollack effect as transformation -OH→ O^- + dark proton, followed by the transfer of electron as dark electron to the negative electrode or to electrolyte, would replace C-OH with C-O. O has an unpaired electron. The loading of hydrogen would transform C-O back to C-OH.

A feed of hydrogen and irradiation by IR light to induce the Pollack effect as the analog of photosynthesis would create dark electrons and protons accelerating them in the electric field. Could this store energy to chemical ordinary energy to electrolyte as they transform to ordinary protons and electrons and bind chemically?

When hydrogen gas consisting of H₂ molecules is used to generate energy, it qwould combine with oxygen molecules O₂ and generate water. Now this process should occur for H₂ and C-O of carbon nanotubes to create C-OH. Is this process possible energetically? The reaction H₂ +2C-O rightarrow 2C-OH should occur. Is the binding energy for 2 C-OH bonds larger than the sum of binding energies of 2C-O and H₂? See the article Are Pollack batteries possible?.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Source: https://matpitka.blogspot.com/2026/02/are-pollack-batteries-possible.html