Covalently Connected Carbon Nanostructures for Current Collectors in Both the Cathode and Anode of Li-S Batteries

Song Jin; Sen Xin; Linjun Wang; Zhenzhen Du; Lina Cao; Jiafeng Chen; Xianghua Kong; Ming Gong; Junling Lu; Yanwu Zhu; Hengxing Ji; Rodney S Ruoff

doi:10.1002/adma.201602704

Covalently Connected Carbon Nanostructures for Current Collectors in Both the Cathode and Anode of Li-S Batteries

Adv Mater. 2016 Nov;28(41):9094-9102. doi: 10.1002/adma.201602704. Epub 2016 Sep 8.

Authors

Song Jin¹, Sen Xin², Linjun Wang³, Zhenzhen Du¹, Lina Cao⁴, Jiafeng Chen¹, Xianghua Kong², Ming Gong⁵, Junling Lu⁴, Yanwu Zhu¹, Hengxing Ji⁶, Rodney S Ruoff⁷

Affiliations

¹ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, CAS Key Laboratory of Materials for Energy Conversion, iChEM (Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemistry for Energy Materials), University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China.
² School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei, 230009, China.
³ Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale and Center for Micro- and Nanoscale Research and Fabrication, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China.
⁴ Department of Chemical Physics and CAS Key Laboratory of Materials for Energy Conversion, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China.
⁵ Material Test and Analysis Lab, Engineering and Materials Science Experiment Center, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China.
⁶ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, CAS Key Laboratory of Materials for Energy Conversion, iChEM (Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemistry for Energy Materials), University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China. jihengx@ustc.edu.cn.
⁷ Center for Multidimensional Carbon Materials (CMCM), Institute for Basic Science (IBS) Center at the Ulsan National Institute of Science & Technology (UNIST) Campus, Department of Chemistry and School of Materials Science, UNIST, Ulsan, 689-798, South Korea.

PMID: 27604953
DOI: 10.1002/adma.201602704

Abstract

A 3D current collector made of covalently connected carbon nanostructures is presented, which can significantly improve battery performance when used as the cathode and/or anode. A Li-S cell assembled using these current collectors, with the cathode loaded with elemental sulfur and the anode loaded with lithium metal, delivers a high-rate capacity of 860 mA h g^-1 at 12 C.

Keywords: Li-S batteries; covalently connected; current collectors; sp2-hybridized carbon nanostructures.