Enhancing Ultrafast Lithium Ion Storage of Li4Ti5O12 by Tailored TiC/C Core/Shell Skeleton Plus Nitrogen Doping

By Z. Yao, Xiaohu Xia, D. Xie, Yadong Wang, Cheng-ao Zhou, Sufu Liu, Shengjue Deng, Xiuli Wang, J. Tu. Advanced Functional Materials, 2018

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It is of great importance to reinforce electronic and ionic conductivity of Li4Ti5O12 electrodes to achieve fast reaction kinetics and good high‐power capability. Herein, for the first time, a dual strategy of combing N‐doped Li4Ti5O12 (N‐LTO) with highly conductive TiC/C skeleton to realize enhanced ultrafast Li ion storage is reported. Interlinked hydrothermal‐synthesized N‐LTO nanosheets are homogeneously decorated on the chemical vapor deposition (CVD) derived TiC/C nanowires forming binder‐free N‐LTO@TiC/C core–branch arrays. Positive advantages including large surface area, strong mechanical stability, and enhanced electronic/ionic conductivity are obtained in the designed integrated arrays and rooted upon synergistic TiC/C matrix and N doping. The above appealing features can effectively boost kinetic properties throughout the N‐LTO@TiC/C electrodes to realize outstanding high‐rate capability at different working temperatures (143 mAh g−1/10 C at 25 °C and 122 mAh g−1/50 C at 50 °C) and notable cycling stability with a capacity retention of 99.3% after 10 000 cycles at 10 C. Moreover, superior high‐rate cycling life is also demonstrated for the full cells with N‐LTO@TiC/C anode and LiFePO4 cathode. The dual strategy may provoke wide interests in fast energy storage areas and motivate the further performance improvement of power‐type lithium ion batteries (LIBs).

Subfields: Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/53a7db0872158d0a6e726cf4496ba9c5fe5b6485