Amorphous Sb/C composite with isotropic expansion property as an ultra-stable and high-rate anode for lithium-ion batteries

Antimony(Sb)is an intriguing anode material for Li-ion batteries(LIBs)owing to its high theoretical capacity of 660 m Ah·g^(-1)and appropriate working potential of~0.8 V(vs.Li^(+)/Li).However,just like all alloying materials,the Sb anode suffers from huge volume expansion(230%)during repeated insertion/extraction of Li+ions,resulting in structural deterioration and rapid capacity decay.In this work,a novel amorphous Sb/C composite with atomically dispersed Sb particles in carbon matrix is prepared via a straightforward high-energy ball milling approach.The intimate intermixing of amorphous Sb with C provides homogeneous element distribution and isotropic volume expansion during cycling,resulting in persistent structural stability.Meanwhile,the disordered structure of amorphous material shortens the diffusion distance of lithium ions/electrons,promoting fast reaction kinetics and rate capability.Benefiting from the aforementioned effects,the amorphous Sb/C exhibits a high reversible capacity of537.4 m Ah·g^(-1)at 0.1 A·g^(-1)and retains 201.0 m Ah·g^(-1)at an ultrahigh current rate of 10.0 A·g^(-1).Even after 1500deep cycles at 2.0 A·g^(-1),the amorphous Sb/C electrode still maintains 86.3%of its initial capacity,which outperforms all existing Sb-based anodes reported so far.Postmortem analysis further reveals a greatly reduced volume variation of merely 34.6%for the amorphous Sb/C electrode,much lower than that of 223.1%for crystalline Sb materials.This study presents a new approach to stabilizing Sb-based alloy anodes and contributes to the construction of high-performance amorphous anode materials for LIBs,enabling advanced energy storage.