Emerging strategies for steering orientational deposition toward high-performance Zn metal anodes

Abstract

Recent years have witnessed the renaissance of aqueous Zn-ion batteries (AZIBs). Nevertheless, the current development of high-performance AZIBs is confronted by the rapid capacity decay and irreversible cycling of Zn anodes, the culprit of which is unremitted dendritic growth. Harnessing the preferential deposition of Zn is an effective manoeuvre in the sense of alleviating problematic dendrite issues. Meanwhile, numerous studies have revealed that the crystallographic orientations of as-deposited Zn are close related to battery performance. Nonetheless, there is a lack of comprehensive overview to shed light on the formation rules and underlying mechanisms relating to induced orientation. In this review, we summarize the emerging design strategies of steering Zn orientational deposition and elaborate on the mechanistic insights toward the realization of highly reversible Zn anodes. The existing challenges and future outlooks in this realm are proposed at the end of the review to envisage the commercialization of AZIBs.