M. Stanley Whittingham is a co-winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his development of the lithium-ion battery.

The professor joined Binghamton University in 1988 after more than a decade of work with Exxon Research and Technology. That's where he received a patent for a rechargeable lithium-ion battery, which is now used in so many of our daily activities.

But Whittingham and his team said they never could have envisioned everything that would flow from their work.

"We had big visions in those days. Exxon wanted to be the energy company of the world. They wanted to build an electric vehicle. And they put a lot of money went into solar cells and so on. So we hoped it would grow, but we never envisioned it growing this far," said Whittingham.

Professor Whittingham shares the award with John B. Goodenough, at the University of Texas at Austin and Akira Yoshino of Meijo University in Japan.