Updated Tuesday, February 12, 2013 at 10:06 PM WASHINGTON — Tiny
crystals that can cause lithium-ion batteries to short-circuit
and fail are among the areas under investigation in Boeing 787
fire and smoke incidents, according to a government agency
conducting the probe. “It’s definitely something we’re looking
at,” Kelly Nantel, spokeswoman for the National Transportation
Safety Board, said in an interview. The crystals known as
dendrites aren’t a central focus of the investigation and the
safety board hasn’t found evidence of them in the battery that
burned Jan. 7 aboard a Boeing 787 operated by Japan Airlines
that had just landed in Boston, Nantel said. Nantel also said
investigators haven’t seen evidence of the crystals in other
batteries they have examined. Dendrites, which can impede
electrical flow and cause overheating, are a known cause of
battery failure, according to a 2010 article in the magazine
Nature. The particles are among several areas under
investigation that could have caused one of eight