Issue 38, 2020

A dendrite-free zinc anode for rechargeable aqueous batteries

Abstract

Zinc is a promising anode material for rechargeable aqueous batteries owing to its high specific capacity, low cost, and environmental friendliness. However, the uncontrollable Zn dendrite growth remains a grand challenge that hinders the practical application of this type of electrode. Here, we create a functional porous polybenzimidazole (PBI) nanofiber layer onto a Cu surface as the substrate of the Zn anode to mitigate dendrite formation. The PBI nanofibers with abundant N-containing functional groups not only allow uniform Zn nucleation on the Cu surface but also facilitate uniform transport of Zn2+ ions via electrokinetic conduction, leading to a dendrite-free Zn deposition and thus, a highly reversible Zn plating/stripping process. As a result, a symmetric cell equipped with this newly developed Zn electrode is stably cycled for over 1000 cycles without short-circuits at a current density of 10 mA cm−2. More impressively, when paired with a MnO2 cathode, the full cell delivers a nearly 100% capacity retention after 1000 cycles at 1 A g−1 with a specific capacity of about 150 mA h g−1. These results demonstrate that the functional porous PBI nanofiber layer created in this work stands to both dramatically extend battery cycle life and boost battery performance.

Graphical abstract: A dendrite-free zinc anode for rechargeable aqueous batteries

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
28 Jul 2020
Accepted
17 Sep 2020
First published
18 Sep 2020

J. Mater. Chem. A, 2020,8, 20175-20184

A dendrite-free zinc anode for rechargeable aqueous batteries

Q. Jian, Y. Wan, J. Sun, M. Wu and T. Zhao, J. Mater. Chem. A, 2020, 8, 20175 DOI: 10.1039/D0TA07348B

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