AbstractsEngineering

Strain engineered nanomembranes as anodes for lithium ion batteries

by Junwen Deng




Institution: TU Chemnitz
Department: Elektrotechnik und Informationstechnik
Degree: PhD
Year: 2015
Record ID: 1115463
Full text PDF: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bsz:ch1-qucosa-159972


Abstract

Lithium ion batteries (LIBs) have attracted considerable interest due to their wide range of applications, such as portable electronics, electric vehicles (EVs) and aerospace applications. Particularly, the emergence of a variety of nanostructured materials has driven the development of LIBs towards the next generation, which is featured with high specific energy and large power density. Herein, rolled-up nanotechnology is introduced for the design of strain-released materials as anodes of LIBs. Upon this approach, self-rolled nanostructures can be elegantly combined with different functional materials and form a tubular shape by relaxing the intrinsic strain, thus allowing for enhanced tolerance towards stress cracking. In addition, the hollow tube center efficiently facilitates electrolyte mass flow and accommodates volume variation during cycling. In this context, such structures are promising candidates for electrode materials of LIBs to potentially address their intrinsic issues. This work focuses on the development of superior structures of Si and SnO2 for LIBs based on the rolled-up nanotech. Specifically, Si is the most promising substitute for graphite anodes due to its abundance and high theoretical gravimetric capacity. Combined with the C material, a Si/C self-wound nanomembrane structure is firstly realized. Benefiting from a strain-released tubular shape, the bilayer self-rolled structures exhibit an enhanced electrochemical behavior over commercial Si microparticles. Remarkably, this behavior is further improved by introducing a double-sided carbon coating to form a C/Si/C self-rolled structure. With SnO2 as active material, an intriguing sandwich-stacked structure is studied. Furthermore, this novel structure, with a minimized strain energy due to strain release, exposes more active sites for the electrochemical reactions, and also provides additional channels for fast ion diffusion and electron transport. The electrochemical characterization and morphology evolution reveal the excellent cycling performance and stability of such structures.