Protection of parallel battery cells in a battery

A method of protecting a battery, the method comprising:

• at a battery protection system including:
• a sense resistor electrically coupled in series with one of a plurality of rechargeable battery cells in a battery, the plurality of rechargeable battery cells being electrically coupled in parallel to form the battery,
• a comparator coupled to the sense resistor,
• a first switching component coupled to the battery, and
• a first protection integrated circuit (PIC) coupled to the comparator and the first switching component, the first PIC is configured to control charging and discharging of the battery;
• comparing a voltage drop across the sense resistor with a reference voltage to determine whether a subset of the plurality of rechargeable battery cells is not charging in the battery;
• and
• disabling the battery from being charged based on the determination that a subset of the plurality of rechargeable battery cells is not charging in the battery.

A method of protecting a battery, the method comprising:

• providing a sense resistor electrically coupled in series with one of a plurality of rechargeable battery cells in the battery:
• the plurality of rechargeable battery cells being electrically coupled in parallel to form the battery;
• and
• the battery being coupled to a first switching component and a first protection integrated circuit (PIC), the first PIC being configured to control charging and discharging of the battery via the first switching component;
• and
• providing a comparator coupled to the sense resistor and configured to compare a voltage drop across the sense resistor with a reference voltage to determine whether a subset of the plurality of rechargeable battery cells is not charging in the battery, including:
• coupling the comparator to the first PIC, thereby allowing the first PIC to disable the battery from being charged based on a determination that a subset of the plurality of rechargeable battery cells is not charging in the battery.