Lithiophilic Silver Coating on Lithium Metal Surface for Inhibiting Lithium Dendrites

Zefu Zuo; Libin Zhuang; Jinzhuo Xu; Yumeng Shi; Chenliang Su; Peichao Lian; Bingbing Tian

doi:10.3389/fchem.2020.00109

Lithiophilic Silver Coating on Lithium Metal Surface for Inhibiting Lithium Dendrites

Front Chem. 2020 Feb 21:8:109. doi: 10.3389/fchem.2020.00109. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Zefu Zuo^{1

2}, Libin Zhuang², Jinzhuo Xu², Yumeng Shi², Chenliang Su², Peichao Lian¹, Bingbing Tian²

Affiliations

¹ The Higher Educational Key Laboratory for Phosphorus Chemical Engineering of Yunnan Province, Faculty of Chemical Engineering, Kunming University of Science and Technology, Kunming, China.
² International Collaborative Laboratory of 2D Materials for Optoelectronics Science and Technology of Ministry of Education, Institute of Microscale Optoelectronics, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, China.

Abstract

Li metal batteries (LMBs) are known as the ideal energy storage candidates for the future rechargeable batteries due to the high energy density. However, uncontrolled Li dendrites growing during charge/discharge process causes extremely low coulombic efficiency and short lifespan. In this work, a thin lithiophilic layer of Ag was coated on the bare Li surface via a thermal evaporation method, which alleviated volume variations and suppressed Li dendrites growth during cycling. As a result, a long lifespan of 250 h at a current density of 1 mA cm^-2 was achieved in the symmetric cell when using the Ag-modified Li foil (Ag@Li). The LiFePO₄|Li full cell demonstrated an excellent cycling performance with a high specific capacity of 131 mAh g^-1 even after 300 cycles at 0.5 C. This study offers a suitable method for stabilizing Li metal anodes in LMBs.

Keywords: Ag layer; Li dendrites; Li metal batteries; lithiophilic layer; thermal evaporation.