Issue 40, 2019

Nano-Cu-embedded carbon for dendrite-free lithium metal anodes

Abstract

Lithium metal has been considered as a promising anode material for a long time because of its inherent high capacity and low potential. However, dendrite formation upon cycling hinders its application. Herein, a nano-Cu-embedded porous carbon (Cu@carbon) is synthesized by a simple heat treatment of a Cu–organic framework, and is then applied as a host for Li plating/stripping. It is found that the nano-Cu particles are uniformly embedded in the bulk and surface of the carbon, integrating high conductivity and high surface area. DFT calculations and experimental data indicate that the CuCx formed at the interface can serve as lithiophilic sites for Li nucleation and growth. As a result, the host material exhibits a dendrite-free Li plating/stripping. The half cell (Li‖Cu@carbon) shows a high coulombic efficiency of 99.3% over 200 cycles even with a high cycling capacity of 4 mA h cm−2, and the Li@Cu@carbon based symmetric cell can be cycled stably for over 2000 h at 1.0 mA cm−2. Furthermore, the corresponding Li-metal capacitor (activated carbon‖Li@Cu@carbon) and battery (LiFePO4‖Li@Cu@carbon) exhibit high cycling stability, with 80.1% capacity retention after 10 000 cycles (capacitor) and 94.7% capacity retention after 1000 cycles (battery). These achievements make our anode among the most stable Li anodes reported so far.

Graphical abstract: Nano-Cu-embedded carbon for dendrite-free lithium metal anodes

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
22 Aug 2019
Accepted
16 Sep 2019
First published
17 Sep 2019

J. Mater. Chem. A, 2019,7, 22930-22938

Nano-Cu-embedded carbon for dendrite-free lithium metal anodes

Z. Wang, Z. Yu, B. Wang, Z. Guo, N. Wang, Y. Wang and Y. Xia, J. Mater. Chem. A, 2019, 7, 22930 DOI: 10.1039/C9TA09232C

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