TY - JOUR
T1 - A dendrite-free zinc anode for rechargeable aqueous batteries
AU - Jian, Qinping
AU - Wan, Yuhan
AU - Sun, Jing
AU - Wu, Maochun
AU - Zhao, Tianshou
N1 - Funding Information:
The work described in this paper was supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (Project No. T23-601/17-R) and HKUST Fund of Nanhai (Grant No. FSNH-18FYTRI01).
Publisher Copyright:
© The Royal Society of Chemistry 2020.
PY - 2020/10/14
Y1 - 2020/10/14
N2 - 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+ionsviaelectrokinetic 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 MnO2cathode, the full cell delivers a nearly 100% capacity retention after 1000 cycles at 1 A g−1with 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.
AB - 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+ionsviaelectrokinetic 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 MnO2cathode, the full cell delivers a nearly 100% capacity retention after 1000 cycles at 1 A g−1with 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.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85092439240&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1039/d0ta07348b
DO - 10.1039/d0ta07348b
M3 - Journal article
AN - SCOPUS:85092439240
SN - 2050-7488
VL - 8
SP - 20175
EP - 20184
JO - Journal of Materials Chemistry A
JF - Journal of Materials Chemistry A
IS - 38
ER -