From Nanoalloy to Nano-Laminated Interfaces for Highly Stable Alkali-Metal Anodes

Parham Pirayesh; Karnpiwat Tantratian; Maedeh Amirmaleki; Feipeng Yang; Enzhong Jin; Yijia Wang; Lyudmila V Goncharova; Jinghua Guo; Tobin Filleter; Lei Chen; Yang Zhao

doi:10.1002/adma.202301414

From Nanoalloy to Nano-Laminated Interfaces for Highly Stable Alkali-Metal Anodes

Adv Mater. 2023 Jul;35(29):e2301414. doi: 10.1002/adma.202301414. Epub 2023 Jun 1.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, N6A 5B9, Canada.
² Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Michigan-Dearborn, Dearborn, MI, 48128, USA.
³ Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, The University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, M5S 3G8, Canada.
⁴ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, 02139, USA.
⁵ Advanced Light Source, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, 94720, USA.
⁶ Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, N6A 3K7, Canada.

PMID: 37058276
DOI: 10.1002/adma.202301414

Abstract

Metal anodes are considered the holy grail for next-generation batteries because of their high gravimetric/volumetric specific capacity and low electrochemical potential. However, several unsolved challenges have impeded their practical applications, such as dendrite growth, interfacial side reactions, dead layer formation, and volume change. An electrochemically, chemically, and mechanically stable artificial solid electrolyte interphase is key to addressing the aforementioned issue with metal anodes. This study demonstrates a new concept of organic and inorganic hybrid interfaces for both Li- and Na-metal anodes. Through tailoring the compositions of the hybrid interfaces, a nanoalloy structure to nano-laminated structure is realized. As a result, the nanoalloy interface (1Al₂ O₃ -1alucone or 2Al₂ O₃ -2alucone) presents the most stable electrochemical performances for both Li-and Na-metal anodes. The optimized thicknesses required for the nanoalloy interfaces for Li- and Na-metal anodes are different. A cohesive zone model is applied to interpret the underlying mechanism. Furthermore, the influence of the mechanical stabilities of the different interfaces on the electrochemical performances is investigated experimentally and theoretically. This approach provides a fundamental understanding and establishes the bridge between mechanical properties and electrochemical performance for alkali-metal anodes.

Keywords: Li-metal batteries; Na-metal batteries; alkali-metal anodes; artificial interfaces; atomic layer deposition (ALD) and molecular layer deposition (MLD); nano-hybrid films.

Abstract

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