High-Capacity Micrometer-Sized Li2S Particles as Cathode Materials for Advanced Rechargeable Lithium-Ion Batteries
- 10 September 2012
- journal article
- research article
- Published by American Chemical Society (ACS) in Journal of the American Chemical Society
- Vol. 134 (37), 15387-15394
- https://doi.org/10.1021/ja3052206
Abstract
Li2S is a high-capacity cathode material for lithium metal-free rechargeable batteries. It has a theoretical capacity of 1166 mAh/g, which is nearly 1 order of magnitude higher than traditional metal oxides/phosphates cathodes. However, Li2S is usually considered to be electrochemically inactive due to its high electronic resistivity and low lithium-ion diffusivity. In this paper, we discover that a large potential barrier (∼1 V) exists at the beginning of charging for Li2S. By applying a higher voltage cutoff, this barrier can be overcome and Li2S becomes active. Moreover, this barrier does not appear again in the following cycling. Subsequent cycling shows that the material behaves similar to common sulfur cathodes with high energy efficiency. The initial discharge capacity is greater than 800 mAh/g for even 10 μm Li2S particles. Moreover, after 10 cycles, the capacity is stabilized around 500–550 mAh/g with a capacity decay rate of only ∼0.25% per cycle. The origin of the initial barrier is found to be the phase nucleation of polysulfides, but the amplitude of barrier is mainly due to two factors: (a) charge transfer directly between Li2S and electrolyte without polysulfide and (b) lithium-ion diffusion in Li2S. These results demonstrate a simple and scalable approach to utilizing Li2S as the cathode material for rechargeable lithium-ion batteries with high specific energy.Keywords
This publication has 42 references indexed in Scilit:
- High-capacity Li2S–nanocarbon composite electrode for all-solid-state rechargeable lithium batteriesJournal of Materials Chemistry, 2012
- In Operando X-ray Diffraction and Transmission X-ray Microscopy of Lithium Sulfur BatteriesJournal of the American Chemical Society, 2012
- Improving the Performance of Lithium–Sulfur Batteries by Conductive Polymer CoatingACS Nano, 2011
- New insights into the limiting parameters of the Li/S rechargeable cellJournal of Power Sources, 2011
- Graphene-Wrapped Sulfur Particles as a Rechargeable Lithium–Sulfur Battery Cathode Material with High Capacity and Cycling StabilityNano Letters, 2011
- Stabilizing lithium–sulphur cathodes using polysulphide reservoirsNature Communications, 2011
- Highly conductive paper for energy-storage devicesProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2009
- Battery materials for ultrafast charging and dischargingNature, 2009
- Crystalline-Amorphous Core−Shell Silicon Nanowires for High Capacity and High Current Battery ElectrodesNano Letters, 2009
- Effects of carbon coating on the electrochemical properties of sulfur cathode for lithium/sulfur cellJournal of Power Sources, 2008