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Nano Research 2020, 13(12): 3347-3357 https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-020-3015-2
Research Article | Issue | Published: 25 August 2020

An ultrasound-triggered cation chelation and reassembly route to one-dimensional Ni-rich cathode material enabling fast charging and stable cycling of Li-ion batteries

Show Author's Information Yongjian Lai1,  Zhaojie Li1,  Wenxia Zhao2,  Xiaoning Cheng2,  Shuo Xu1,  Xiao Yu1,  Yong Liu1( )
School of Materials Science and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials and Technologies, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
Instrumental Analysis & Research Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
Keywords:
cathode materials, Li-ion batteries, ultrasound, Ni-rich oxides, one dimensional structure
Topics:
CathodesLithium batteriesLithium compoundsManganese compoundsNickel oxidePositive ions
Cite this article:
Lai Y, Li Z, Zhao W, et al. An ultrasound-triggered cation chelation and reassembly route to one-dimensional Ni-rich cathode material enabling fast charging and stable cycling of Li-ion batteries. Nano Research, 2020, 13(12): 3347-3357. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-020-3015-2
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Abstract Full text Electronic supplementary material About this article

Ni-rich oxides, LiNixMnyCozO2 (NMC), are among leading candidates for cathode materials in Li-ion batteries. However, they are mostly fabricated by coprecipitation approach under complex conditions, which usually produces large secondary particles composed of aggregated primary particles. Undesirable cation mixing and crack propagation upon cycling block ion and electron transport, result in fast capacity fading and poor rate capability. Herein, we present an ultrasound-triggered cation chelation and reassembly route for synthesizing one-dimensional precursor with homogeneous element distribution at the atomic level. This process is accomplished by the synergistic combination of ultrasound and surfactant, which can disperse reactants and remove hydration shells surrounding cations so as to accelerate chelating reaction, and then separate and assemble chelates into one dimensional structure. The whole synthesis time is only 20 min (8.9 min of ultrasonic working time) in an open vessel under natural ambient conditions. One-dimensional LiNi0.6Mn0.2Co0.2O2 has a high reversible capacity (184 mAh·g-1 at 0.1 C) and long cycling stability (95.1% and 82.4% capacity retention for 100 and 1000 cycles, respectively). The short charging time of 76 s is realized at super high current rate of 20 C, which is very important to improve the competitiveness of electric vehicles relative to fuel vehicles. Our synthetic approach can provide a general strategy for the growth of mixed-metal-EDTA chelate precursors by changing the feeding ratio of Ni2+, Mn2+ and Co2+ cations in reaction for fabricating NMC cathode materials with other compositions.


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Electronic supplementary material
About this article

An ultrasound-triggered cation chelation and reassembly route to one-dimensional Ni-rich cathode material enabling fast charging and stable cycling of Li-ion batteries

Show Author's information Yongjian Lai1, Zhaojie Li1, Wenxia Zhao2, Xiaoning Cheng2, Shuo Xu1, Xiao Yu1, Yong Liu1( )
School of Materials Science and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials and Technologies, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
Instrumental Analysis & Research Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China

Abstract

Ni-rich oxides, LiNixMnyCozO2 (NMC), are among leading candidates for cathode materials in Li-ion batteries. However, they are mostly fabricated by coprecipitation approach under complex conditions, which usually produces large secondary particles composed of aggregated primary particles. Undesirable cation mixing and crack propagation upon cycling block ion and electron transport, result in fast capacity fading and poor rate capability. Herein, we present an ultrasound-triggered cation chelation and reassembly route for synthesizing one-dimensional precursor with homogeneous element distribution at the atomic level. This process is accomplished by the synergistic combination of ultrasound and surfactant, which can disperse reactants and remove hydration shells surrounding cations so as to accelerate chelating reaction, and then separate and assemble chelates into one dimensional structure. The whole synthesis time is only 20 min (8.9 min of ultrasonic working time) in an open vessel under natural ambient conditions. One-dimensional LiNi0.6Mn0.2Co0.2O2 has a high reversible capacity (184 mAh·g-1 at 0.1 C) and long cycling stability (95.1% and 82.4% capacity retention for 100 and 1000 cycles, respectively). The short charging time of 76 s is realized at super high current rate of 20 C, which is very important to improve the competitiveness of electric vehicles relative to fuel vehicles. Our synthetic approach can provide a general strategy for the growth of mixed-metal-EDTA chelate precursors by changing the feeding ratio of Ni2+, Mn2+ and Co2+ cations in reaction for fabricating NMC cathode materials with other compositions.

Keywords: cathode materials, Li-ion batteries, ultrasound, Ni-rich oxides, one dimensional structure

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Acknowledgements

Publication history

Received: 04 May 2020
Revised: 12 July 2020
Accepted: 27 July 2020
Published: 25 August 2020
Issue date: December 2020

Copyright

© Tsinghua University Press and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature

Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51772337) and Free Exploration Fund of State Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials and Technologies of China (No. OEMT-2017-ZY-09).

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