TY  - JOUR
AU  - Zhang, Jiyuan
AU  - Zhang, Weiye
AU  - Xue, Jiarui
AU  - Zhu, Nan
AU  - Ge, Yunping
AU  - Lei, Zhibin
AU  - Li, Qi
AU  - He, Xuexia
AU  - Liu, Zonghuai
AU  - Sun, Jie
PY  - 2026
TI  - Atomic tuning of TixCr1−xN catalysts to enhance the polysulfide trapping and conversion in lithium–sulfur batteries
JO  - Nano Research
SN  - 1998-0124
SP  - 94908247
VL  - 19
IS  - 5
AB  - Lithium–sulfur (Li–S) batteries face critical challenges, including sluggish polysulfide redox kinetics and the shuttle effect. This study presents a novel self-supporting carbon nanofibers (CNFs) decorated with TixCr1−xN (TCN) solid–solution nanoparticles (CNFs@TCN) as Li2S6 host for Li–S batteries. By leveraging electrospinning and high-temperature nitridation reaction, we engineered a flexible electrode with tunable Ti/Cr ratios. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations and experimental analysis reveal that the TCN solid–solution phase optimizes electronic structure via Cr substitution, enhancing polysulfide adsorption and catalytic conversion kinetics. The CNFs@TCN-1/2 cathode (Ti:Cr = 1:2) exhibits exceptional performance of high initial capacity (1359 mAh·g−1), ultralow capacity decay (0.012% per cycle at 2 C), and remarkable rate capability (803 mAh·g−1 at 3 C). Under high sulfur loading (6.12 mg·cm−2) and lean electrolyte (electrolyte/sulfur (E/S) ratio = 9.3 μL·mg−1), it delivers an areal capacity of 4.87 mAh·cm−2. This work demonstrates atomic-level d-band engineering of bimetallic nitrides as a powerful strategy to suppress shuttle effects and boost sulfur redox kinetics in practical Li–S batteries.
UR  - https://doi.org/10.26599/NR.2025.94908247
DO  - 10.26599/NR.2025.94908247