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Nano Research 2022, 15(11): 9792-9799 https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-022-4261-2
Research Article | Issue | Published: 21 March 2022

Fast-charging and dendrite-free lithium metal anode enabled by partial lithiation of graphene aerogel

Show Author's Information Yong Ma1,§,  Yuting Gu1,§,  Ying He1,  Le Wei1,  Yuebin Lian2,  Weiyi Pan1,  Xinjian Li1,  Yanhui Su1,  Yang Peng1( ),  Zhao Deng1( ),  Zhongfan Liu1,3,4
College of Energy, Soochow Institute for Energy and Materials Innovations (SIEMIS), Key Laboratory of Advanced Carbon Materials and Wearable Energy Technologies of Jiangsu Province, Soochow University, Suzhou 215006, China
School of Photoelectric Engineering, Changzhou institute of technology, Changzhou 213032, China
Beijing Graphene Institute (BGI), Beijing 100095, China
Center for Nanochemistry (CNC), College of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China

§ Yong Ma and Yuting Gu contributed equally to this work.

Keywords:
dendrite-free, graphene aerogel, fast-charging, partial infusion, Li metal anodes
Topics:
Lithium batteries
Cite this article:
Ma Y, Gu Y, He Y, et al. Fast-charging and dendrite-free lithium metal anode enabled by partial lithiation of graphene aerogel. Nano Research, 2022, 15(11): 9792-9799. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-022-4261-2
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Abstract Full text Electronic supplementary material About this article

The development of deeply cyclable lithium metal batteries with fast-charging capability offers a promising solution to relieve the “range anxiety” in driving electric vehicles. Conventional lithium metal anodes suffered from low operating current densities and shallow charge/discharge depths, owing to the intrinsic dendrite growth governed by Sand’s law. Herein, we come up with a novel design of heavy-duty lithium metal anode fabricated by partially infusing the three-dimensional (3D) porous graphene aerogel with molten Li. Both electroanalytical measurements and simulations show that the unique electrode architecture brings notable advantages in mediating smooth Li plating/stripping, including reduced local current density, inhibited dendrite growth, buffered volume fluctuation, as well as more efficient Li utilization. Consequently, a remarkable cycling performance in symmetric cells for over 400 cycles (800 h) with an ultrahigh cycling capacity of 15 mAh·cm−2 at 15 mA·cm−2 is achieved, which, to our best knowledge, has been never seen in literature. LiFePO4 full cells demonstrate a superb rate capability up to 10 C and a prolonged cycling of 1,600 cycles at 2 C with the per-cycle capacity decay of only 0.023%. This study paves the way for the ultimate deployment of lithium metal batteries in real-world applications that require fast charging and deep cycling.


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Electronic supplementary material
About this article

Fast-charging and dendrite-free lithium metal anode enabled by partial lithiation of graphene aerogel

Show Author's information Yong Ma1,§, Yuting Gu1,§, Ying He1, Le Wei1, Yuebin Lian2, Weiyi Pan1, Xinjian Li1, Yanhui Su1, Yang Peng1( ), Zhao Deng1( ), Zhongfan Liu1,3,4
College of Energy, Soochow Institute for Energy and Materials Innovations (SIEMIS), Key Laboratory of Advanced Carbon Materials and Wearable Energy Technologies of Jiangsu Province, Soochow University, Suzhou 215006, China
School of Photoelectric Engineering, Changzhou institute of technology, Changzhou 213032, China
Beijing Graphene Institute (BGI), Beijing 100095, China
Center for Nanochemistry (CNC), College of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China

§ Yong Ma and Yuting Gu contributed equally to this work.

Abstract

The development of deeply cyclable lithium metal batteries with fast-charging capability offers a promising solution to relieve the “range anxiety” in driving electric vehicles. Conventional lithium metal anodes suffered from low operating current densities and shallow charge/discharge depths, owing to the intrinsic dendrite growth governed by Sand’s law. Herein, we come up with a novel design of heavy-duty lithium metal anode fabricated by partially infusing the three-dimensional (3D) porous graphene aerogel with molten Li. Both electroanalytical measurements and simulations show that the unique electrode architecture brings notable advantages in mediating smooth Li plating/stripping, including reduced local current density, inhibited dendrite growth, buffered volume fluctuation, as well as more efficient Li utilization. Consequently, a remarkable cycling performance in symmetric cells for over 400 cycles (800 h) with an ultrahigh cycling capacity of 15 mAh·cm−2 at 15 mA·cm−2 is achieved, which, to our best knowledge, has been never seen in literature. LiFePO4 full cells demonstrate a superb rate capability up to 10 C and a prolonged cycling of 1,600 cycles at 2 C with the per-cycle capacity decay of only 0.023%. This study paves the way for the ultimate deployment of lithium metal batteries in real-world applications that require fast charging and deep cycling.

Keywords: dendrite-free, graphene aerogel, fast-charging, partial infusion, Li metal anodes

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Publication history
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Acknowledgements

Publication history

Received: 14 December 2021
Revised: 18 February 2022
Accepted: 21 February 2022
Published: 21 March 2022
Issue date: November 2022

Copyright

© Tsinghua University Press 2022

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 22075193 and 22072101), the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (No. BK20211306), the Key Technology Initiative of Suzhou Municipal Science and Technology Bureau (No. SYG201934), and Six Talent Peaks Project in Jiangsu Province (No. TD-XCL-006). The authors also thank for the support from the Honorary Professor Program of Jiangsu Province and Priority Academic Program Development (PAPD) of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions.

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