Solid-state sodium batteries (SSSBs) are gaining significant attention for their potential in electrochemical energy storage. However, the development of SSSBs is hindered by the low ionic conductivity of sodium-ion solid electrolytes (SSEs). Herein, Ce with larger ionic radium is employed to substitute Zr in Na3Zr2Si2PO12 (NZSP), aiming to enhance the ionic conductivity of the SSEs. Through structural analysis and theoretical calculation, it is inferred that Ce doping is favorable for stabilizing the phases with higher ionic conductivity, increasing Na+ concentration by substitution of Zr4+ with Ce3+ and facilitating the generation of densified microscopic morphology. The Ce-doped NZSP achieves a high room-temperature conductivity of 2.08 mS×cm−1 and exhibits good interfacial compatibility with Na metal. Furthermore, the assembled Na3V2(PO4)3 cell based on Ce-doped NZSP maintains the capacity of 111.18 mAh×g−1 at 0.5 C after 200 cycles with the high retention of 98.06%.
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Piezoelectric nanogenerators (PENGs) that can harvest mechanical energy from ambient environment have broad prospects for multi-functional applications. Here, multi-layered piezoelectric composites with a porous structure based on highly oriented Pb(Zr0.52Ti0.48)O3/PVDF (PZT/PVDF) electrospinning fibers are prepared via a laminating method to construct high-performance PENGs. PZT particles as piezoelectric reinforcing phases are embedded in PVDF fibers and facilitate the formation of polar β phase in PVDF. The multi-layered, porous structure effectively promotes the overall polarization and surface bound charge density, resulting in a highly efficient electromechanical conversion. The PENG based on 10 wt% PZT/PVDF composite fibers with a 220 µm film thickness outputs an optimal voltage of 62.0 V and a power of 136.9 μW, which are 3.4 and 6.5 times those of 10 wt% PZT/PVDF casting film-based PENG, respectively. Importantly, the PENG shows a high sensitivity of 12.4 V·N-1, presenting a significant advantage in comparison to PENGs with other porous structures. In addition, the composites show excellent flexibility with a Young’s modulus of 227.2 MPa and an elongation of 262.3%. This study shows a great potential application of piezoelectric fiber composites in flexible energy harvesting devices.

Polymer-ceramic composites are widely applied in microwave substrate materials due to the excellent dielectric properties and simple preparation process recently. Polytetrafluoroethylene-based (PTFE) composites filled with Zn0.5Ti0.5NbO4 (ZTN) ceramic particles were fabricated by hot-pressing. The particles were modified by C14H19F13O3Si to enhance the interface compatibility between PTFE and ZTN powders, which was characterized by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and contact angle. The surface characteristic of particles transformed into hydrophobicity and tight microstructure as well as better dielectric properties were obtained after the surface modification. The microstructure, dielectric, thermal, mechanical properties, and water absorption of the composites concerning ZTN content were investigated. Modified ZTN/PTFE composites with 50 vol% ZTN particles exhibit excellent dielectric properties with a high dielectric constant of 8.3, an extremely low dielectric loss of 0.00055 at 7 GHz, and a stable temperature coefficient of the dielectric constant of -12.2 ppm/℃. All the properties show modified ZTN particles filled PTFE composite is the potential material for microwave substrate application.