Preparation of low-load Au-Pd alloy decorated carbon fibers binder-free cathode for Li-O battery.

Developing high-performance cathode is critical to facilitating the development of lithium-oxygen (Li-O) batteries. In this work, a low-load (1.32%) Au-Pd alloy decorated carbon fibers binder-free cathode is prepared by facile magnetron sputtering (MS). It is the first use as a cathode material for Li-O batteries, and exhibits excellent electrochemical performance. During the second to the 30th cycle of the battery operation at a current density of 100 mA g with a limited specific capacity density of 1000 mAh g, the charge and discharge polarization voltage is only about 0.6 V. In addition, the problem of abnormal charge polarization voltage in the first cycle is also investigated. The by-products LiCO are formed during the first discharge, resulting in a significant increase in the charge polarization voltage. The facile preparation method we adopted and our findings may provide new ideas for the future development of Au-Pd alloy composites in Li-O or other metal-air batteries.