Nano Hard Carbon Anodes for Sodium-Ion Batteries

A hindrance to the practical use of sodium-ion batteries is the lack of adequate anode materials. By utilizing the co-intercalation reaction, graphite, which is the most common anode material of lithium-ion batteries, was used for storing sodium ion. However, its performance, such as reversible capa...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Dae-Yeong Kim, Dong-Hyun Kim, Soo-Hyun Kim, Eun-Kyung Lee, Sang-Kyun Park, Ji-Woong Lee, Yong-Sup Yun, Si-Young Choi, Jun Kang
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2019-05-01
Series:Nanomaterials
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2079-4991/9/5/793
Description
Summary:A hindrance to the practical use of sodium-ion batteries is the lack of adequate anode materials. By utilizing the co-intercalation reaction, graphite, which is the most common anode material of lithium-ion batteries, was used for storing sodium ion. However, its performance, such as reversible capacity and coulombic efficiency, remains unsatisfactory for practical needs. Therefore, to overcome these drawbacks, a new carbon material was synthesized so that co-intercalation could occur efficiently. This carbon material has the same morphology as carbon black; that is, it has a wide pathway due to a turbostratic structure, and a short pathway due to small primary particles that allows the co-intercalation reaction to occur efficiently. Additionally, due to the numerous voids present in the inner amorphous structure, the sodium storage capacity was greatly increased. Furthermore, owing to the coarse co-intercalation reaction due to the surface pore structure, the formation of solid-electrolyte interphase was greatly suppressed and the first cycle coulombic efficiency reached 80%. This study shows that the carbon material alone can be used to design good electrode materials for sodium-ion batteries without the use of next-generation materials.
ISSN:2079-4991