Schatz Dominic, Burdenski Chris, Schneider Finn M, Hansmann Max M, Wegner Hermann A
Institute of Organic Chemistry, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Heinrich-Buff-Ring 17, 35392, Gießen, Germany.
Center of Materials Research (ZfM/LaMa), Justus Liebig University, Heinrich-Buff-Ring 16, 35391, Gießen, Germany.
Chemistry. 2025 Apr 9;31(21):e202404001. doi: 10.1002/chem.202404001. Epub 2025 Feb 10.
Aryl diazenes, particularly azobenzenes (AB), represent a versatile class of compounds with significant historical and practical relevance, ranging from dyes to molecular machines, solar thermal and electrochemical storage. Their oxygen-substituted counterparts, azoxybenzenes (AOB), share structural similarities but have been less explored, especially in energy storage applications. This study investigates the redox properties of AOB, comparing them to AB, and evaluates their potential as redox-active materials for energy storage systems. Through cyclic voltammetry (CV) and spectro-electrochemical analyses, we demonstrate that AOBs exhibit a distinct redox behaviour, influenced by the solvent and electrolyte environment, with a reversible oxidation process. Despite their promising redox characteristics, AOBs suffer from capacity decay during galvanostatic cycling, likely due to the instability of the radical cation intermediate. These findings suggest that while AOBs offer intriguing redox properties, further investigation into stabilization strategies are needed for their application in energy storage.
芳基重氮化合物，特别是偶氮苯（AB），是一类用途广泛的化合物，具有重要的历史和实际意义，涵盖从染料到分子机器、太阳能热存储和电化学存储等领域。它们的氧取代类似物，氧化偶氮苯（AOB），具有相似的结构，但研究较少，特别是在储能应用方面。本研究调查了AOB的氧化还原特性，并将其与AB进行比较，评估了它们作为储能系统氧化还原活性材料的潜力。通过循环伏安法（CV）和光谱电化学分析，我们证明AOB表现出独特的氧化还原行为，受溶剂和电解质环境影响，具有可逆的氧化过程。尽管AOB具有令人期待的氧化还原特性，但在恒电流循环过程中会出现容量衰减，这可能是由于自由基阳离子中间体的不稳定性所致。这些发现表明，虽然AOB具有引人关注的氧化还原特性，但要将其应用于储能领域，还需要进一步研究稳定化策略。
