Use of Speckle Pattern for Monitoring Thermal Energy Behavior of Battery Cathode

Laser speckle patterns were used to monitor variations of thermal voltages of a cathode during a battery discharge. Discharge voltages measured with an oscilloscope were utilized as a figure of merit of thermal voltages in Zn metal. Using an optical imaging system, speckle patterns were taken for zinc metal surface over a time period of 3 minutes. Pixel sum distribution functions (PSDFs) were extracted from speckle patterns. Accumulated pixel sums quantified from PSDFs over an optimized grayscale range strongly correlated with discharge voltages. This suggested that dark matter or particles may have the capability of both absorbing and radiating thermal energies simultaneously. The black body-like properties were able to be validated by identifying coincidences with distinct features of a black body spectrum. The pixels belonging to the grayscale range were confirmed to represent dark matter of a speckle pattern. It was clear that dark matter was part of surface plasmon carriers. The proposed sensing system can be applied to monitor thermal energy variations in any material.