I read a news article a couple days ago about a group of researchers in one of our universities creating a new sodium addative of sorts to use in Lithium-ion batteries. It seems to increase the lifespan of these batteries by about ten-fold. I believebit had to do with li-ion batteries using up sodium in the batteries to self-repair damage caused by charging and discharging the batteries. By changing the types of sodium in the battery, the amount of sodium used in each cycly was greatly reduced. I am by no means an expert on the matter, so I hope this made sense. I believe the article was released in one of the major physics magazines.