[1][2] Whittingham is a key figure in the history of lithium-ion batteries, which are used in everything from mobile phones to electric vehicles.

He also invented the first rechargeable lithium metal battery (LMB), patented in 1977 and assigned to Exxon for commercialization in small devices and electric vehicles.

Whittingham's rechargeable lithium metal battery is based on a LiAl anode and an intercalation-type TiS2 cathode.

In 2014, NECCES was awarded $12.8 million, from the U.S. Department of Energy to help accelerate scientific breakthroughs needed to build the 21st-century economy.

Exxon manufactured Whittingham's lithium-ion battery in the 1970s, based on a titanium disulfide cathode and a lithium-aluminum anode.

In addition, titanium disulfide has a particularly fast rate of lithium ion diffusion into the crystal lattice.

Whittingham and his team continued to publish their work in academic journals of electrochemistry and solid-state physics.

"[12] Lithium batteries have limited capacity because less than one lithium-ion/electron is reversibly intercalated per transition metal redox center.

[12][19] In 2018, Whittingham was elected to the National Academy of Engineering, "for pioneering the application of intercalation chemistry for energy storage materials.

"[20] In 2019, Whittingham, along with John B. Goodenough and Akira Yoshino, was awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for the development of lithium-ion batteries.

"[1][2] Stanley is married to Dr. Georgina Whittingham, a professor of Spanish at the State University of New York at Oswego.