Engineering Functional Interface with Built-in Catalytic and Self-Oxidation Sites for Highly Stable Lithium-Sulfur Batteries

Zihan Chen; Licheng Miao; Yancheng Fu; Leyuan Shi; Jinzhou Chen; Xuying Liu; Linlin Zhang

doi:10.1002/chem.202101625

Engineering Functional Interface with Built-in Catalytic and Self-Oxidation Sites for Highly Stable Lithium-Sulfur Batteries

Chemistry. 2021 Oct 19;27(58):14444-14450. doi: 10.1002/chem.202101625. Epub 2021 Sep 21.

Authors

Zihan Chen¹, Licheng Miao², Yancheng Fu¹, Leyuan Shi¹, Jinzhou Chen¹, Xuying Liu¹, Linlin Zhang^{1

3}

Affiliations

¹ The Key Laboratory of Material Processing and Mold of Ministry of Education, Henan Key Laboratory of Advanced Nylon Materials and Application, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, 450001, P. R. China.
² College of Physics and Optoelectronic Engineering, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, 518060, P. R. China.
³ Key Laboratory of Advanced Energy Materials Chemistry (Ministry of Education), College of Chemistry, Nankai University, Tianjin, 300071, P. R. China.

PMID: 34347317
DOI: 10.1002/chem.202101625

Abstract

Lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries have attracted great attention due to their high theoretical energy density. The rapid redox conversion of lithium polysulfides (LiPS) is effective for solving the serious shuttle effect and improving the utilization of active materials. The functional design of the separator interface with fast charge transfer and active catalytic sites is desirable for accelerating the conversion of intermediates. Herein, a graphene-wrapped MnCO₃ nanowire (G@MC) was prepared and utilized to engineer the separator interface. G@MC with active Mn²⁺ sites can effectively anchor the LiPS by forming the Mn-S chemical bond according to our theoretical calculation results. In addition, the catalytic Mn²⁺ sites and conductive graphene layer of G@MC could accelerate the reversible conversion of LiPS via the spontaneous "self-redox" reaction and the rapid electron transfer in electrochemical process. As a result, the G@MC-based battery exhibits only 0.038 % capacity decay (per cycle) after 1000 cycles at 2.0 C. This work affords new insights for designing the integrated functional interface for stable Li-S batteries.

Keywords: built-in catalytic sites; high stability; lithium-sulfur battery; reversible conversion; self-redox.

Abstract

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