Porous SnO nanostructure with a high specific surface area for improved electrochemical performance.

Tin oxide (SnO) has been attractive as an alternative to carbon-based anode materials because of its fairly high theoretical capacity during cycling. However, SnO has critical drawbacks, such as poor cycle stability caused by a large volumetric variation during the alloying/de-alloying reaction and low capacity at a high current density due to its low electrical conductivity. In this study, we synthesized a porous SnO nanostructure (n-SnO) that has a high specific surface area as an anode active material using the Adams fusion method. From the Brunauer-Emmett-Teller analysis and transmission electron microscopy, the as-prepared SnO sample was found to have a mesoporous structure with a fairly high surface area of 122 m g consisting of highly-crystalline nanoparticles with an average particle size of 5.5 nm. Compared to a commercial SnO, n-SnO showed significantly improved electrochemical performance because of its increased specific surface area and short Li ion pathway. Furthermore, during 50 cycles at a high current density of 800 mA g, n-SnO exhibited a high initial capacity of 1024 mA h g and enhanced retention of 53.6% compared to c-SnO (496 mA h g and 23.5%).