Zhou Mengfan, Qi Weiyan, Hu Zongmin, Cheng Mingren, Zhao Xinxin, Xiong Peixun, Su Hai, Li Mengjie, Hu Jimin, Xu Yunhua
School of Materials Science and Engineering, Key Laboratory of Advanced Ceramics and Machining Technology (Ministry of Education), and Tianjin Key Laboratory of Composite and Functional Materials, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China.
School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China.
ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2021 Apr 21;13(15):17629-17638. doi: 10.1021/acsami.1c02186. Epub 2021 Apr 6.
Potassium-metal batteries are attractive candidates for low-cost and large-scale energy storage systems due to the abundance of potassium. However, K metal dendrite growth as well as volume expansion of K metal anodes on cycling have significantly hindered its practical applications. Although enhanced performance has been reported using carbon hosts with complicated structure engineering, they are not suitable for mass production. Herein, a highly potassiophilic carbon nanofiber paper with abundant oxygen-containing functional groups on the surface and a 3D interconnected network architecture is fabricated through a facile, scalable, and environmental-friendly biosynthesis method. As a host for K metal anode, uniform K nucleation and stable plating/stripping performance are demonstrated, with a stable cycling of 1400 h and a low overpotential of 45 mV, which are much better than all carbon hosts without complicated structure engineering. Moreover, full cells pairing the carbon nanofiber paper/K composite anodes with KFe(CN) cathodes exhibit excellent cycle stability and rate capability. The results provide a promising way for realizing dendrite-free K metal anodes and high-performance potassium-ion batteries.
由于钾资源丰富，钾金属电池是低成本大规模储能系统的理想候选者。然而，钾金属枝晶的生长以及循环过程中钾金属阳极的体积膨胀严重阻碍了其实际应用。尽管使用具有复杂结构工程的碳主体已报道了性能的提升，但它们不适用于大规模生产。在此，通过一种简便、可扩展且环保的生物合成方法制备了一种表面具有丰富含氧官能团且具有三维互连网络结构的高亲钾性碳纳米纤维纸。作为钾金属阳极的主体，展示了均匀的钾成核和稳定的电镀/剥离性能，具有1400小时的稳定循环和45 mV的低过电位，这比所有没有复杂结构工程的碳主体都要好得多。此外，将碳纳米纤维纸/K复合阳极与KFe(CN)阴极配对的全电池表现出优异的循环稳定性和倍率性能。这些结果为实现无枝晶钾金属阳极和高性能钾离子电池提供了一条有前景的途径。
