Low-pressure-responsive heat-storage ceramics for automobiles.

The accumulated heat energy of a heat-storage material is typically released over time. If a heat-storage material could preserve its accumulated heat energy for a prolonged period, the applicability of such materials would be expanded greatly. Herein we report a newly fabricated heat-storage material that can store latent heat energy for a long period and release the heat energy upon demand by applying an extremely low pressure. This material is a block-type lambda trititanium pentoxide (block-type λ-Ti3O5). The block-type λ-phase accumulates a large heat energy of 237 kJ L-1 and exhibits a pressure-induced phase transition to beta trititanium pentoxide. The pressure-induced phase transition occurs by applying only several tens of bars, and half of the fraction transforms by 7 MPa (70 bar). Such a low-pressure-responsive heat-storage ceramic is effective to reuse excessive heat in automobiles or waste heat at industrial factories.