Review on lithium metal anodes towards high energy density batteries

Lithium metal anode(LMA) is a promising candidate for achieving next-generation high-energy-density batteries due to its ultrahigh theoretical capacity and most negative electrochemical potential. However, the practical application of lithium metal battery(LMB) is largely retarded by the instable interfaces, uncontrolled dendrites, and rapid capacity deterioration. Herein, we present a comprehensive overview towards the working principles and inherent challenges of LMAs. Firstly, we diligently summarize the intrinsic mechanism of Li stripping and plating process. The recent advances in atomic and mesoscale simulations which are crucial in guiding mechanism study and material design are also summarized. Furthermore, the advanced engineering strategies which have been proved effective in protecting LMAs are systematically reviewed, including electrolyte optimization, artificial interface, composite/alloy anodes and so on. Finally, we highlight the current limitations and promising research directions of LMAs. This review sheds new lights on deeply understanding the intrinsic mechanism of LMAs, and calls for more endeavors to realize practical Li metal batteries.

Single-image night haze removal based on color channel transfer and estimation of spatial variation in atmospheric light

The visible-light imaging system used in military equipment is often subjected to severe weather conditions, such as fog, haze, and smoke, under complex lighting conditions at night that significantly degrade the acquired images. Currently available image defogging methods are mostly suitable for environments with natural light in the daytime, but the clarity of images captured under complex lighting conditions and spatial changes in the presence of fog at night is not satisfactory. This study proposes an algorithm to remove night fog from single images based on an analysis of the statistical characteristics of images in scenes involving night fog. Color channel transfer is designed to compensate for the high attenuation channel of foggy images acquired at night. The distribution of transmittance is estimated by the deep convolutional network DehazeNet, and the spatial variation of atmospheric light is estimated in a point-by-point manner according to the maximum reflection prior to recover the clear image. The results of experiments show that the proposed method can compensate for the high attenuation channel of foggy images at night, remove the effect of glow from a multi-color and non-uniform ambient source of light, and improve the adaptability and visual effect of the removal of night fog from images compared with the conventional method.

Premature deposition of lithium polysulfide in lithium-sulfur batteries

Lithium-sulfur(Li-S)batteries have attracted extensive attention due to ultrahigh theoretical energy density of 2600 Wh kg^(-1).Liquid-solid deposition from dissolved lithium polysulfides(LiPSs)to solid lithium sulfide(Li_(2)S)largely determines the actual battery performances.Herein,a premature liquidsolid deposition process of LiPSs is revealed at higher thermodynamic potential than Li_(2)S deposition in Li-S batteries.The premature solid deposit exhibits higher chemical state and hemispherical morphology in comparison with Li_(2)S,and the premature deposition process is slower in kinetics and higher in deposition dimension.Accordingly,a supersaturation deposition mechanism is proposed to rationalize the above findings based on thermodynamic simulation.This work demonstrates a unique premature liquid-solid deposition process of Li-S batteries.

Dead lithium formation in lithium metal batteries:A phase field model

Lithium metal batteries are the most promising choices for next-generation high-energy–density batteries. However, there is little mechanism understanding on lithium dendrite growth during lithium plating and the dead lithium(the main component of inactive lithium) formation during lithium stripping. This work proposed a phase field model to describe the lithium stripping process with dead lithium formation.The coupling of galvanostatic conditions enables the phase field method to accurately match experimental results. The factors influencing the dead lithium formation on the increasing discharge polarization are revealed. Besides, the simulation of the battery polarization curve, the capacity loss peak, and the Coulomb efficiency is realized. This contribution affords an insightful understanding on dead lithium formation with phase field methods, which can contribute general principles on rational design of lithium metal batteries.

Driving lithium to deposit inside structured lithium metal anodes:A phase field model

Lithium metal anode is one of the most important anode materials for next-generation high-specificenergy secondary batteries.Structured lithium metal anodes have received extensive attention in the development of practical lithium metal batteries.Methods of driving lithium metal to deposit inside the pores of structured lithium metal anodes have always been one of the most concerned issues,especially for highly conductive frameworks.An electrochemical phase field theory with galvanostatic lithium plating process is employed in this work,the mechanism that illustrates the preference of lithium metal to deposit at the top of the framework structure has been revealed,and through the simulation analysis of various regulating strategies,the strategies that can efficiently drive lithium to deposit inside structured pores are summarized.This work presents the theoretical calculation and analysis methods that can be used for the rational design of lithium metal batteries.

A study on the frequency of thyroid nodules and uterine fibroids in Chinese breast cancer patients

Background:Single or multiple thyroid nodules and uterine fibroids are the most common benign gynecologic disease.An increasing number of breast cancer are accompanied with thyroid nodules or uterine fibroids or both of them.However,the incidence of thyroid nodules or uterine fibroids in patients with different subtypes of breast cancer is unclear.Objective:To study the incidence of thyroid nodules or uterine fibroids in patients with different subtypes of breast cancer.Methods:A retrospective cohort study conducted in the First Teaching Hospital of Tianjin University of Traditional Chinese Medicine(China)that included 1,322 female cancer survivors who went to our hospital from January 2014 to November 2019.In this study,we evaluated the frequency of thyroid nodules and uterine fibroids in breast cancer survivors in comparison with other cancer survivors.Besides,we compare the frequency of thyroid nodules and uterine fibroids among different luminal breast cancer.Results:In this study,there were 245 breast cancer survivors,including 58 cases with thyroid nodule,52 cases with uterine fibroids,17 cases with both,152 cases with none.And 1,077 other cancer survivors were collected,including 142 cases with thyroid nodule,172 cases with uterine fibroids,25 cases with both,788 cases with none.According to statistical analysis,the incidence of thyroid nodule and uterine fibroids in breast cancer patients is significantly higher than that in non-breast cancer patients(P<0.01 and P<0.05).Between the molecular classification of breast cancer,among 245 BC patients,58 were combined with thyroid nodule,including 57 cases of luminal-A type BC and 22 cases of combined thyroid nodule;101 cases of luminal-B type BC and 20 cases of combined thyroid nodule;50 cases of HER2-positive over expression type BC and 13 cases of combined thyroid nodule;37 cases of TNBC and 3 cases of combined thyroid nodule,Patients with luminal-A BC have a higher incidence of thyroid nodules compared to other types of BC.Among 245 BC patients,there were 52 cases with uterine fibroids,including 57 cases of luminal-A type BC,5 cases with uterine fibroids;101 cases of luminal-B type BC,32 cases with uterine fibroids;50 cases of HER2-positive over expression type BC,11 cases with uterine fibroids;37 cases of TNBC,4 cases with uterine fibroids.Luminal-B breast cancer is more likely to suffer from uterine fibroids than other types of breast cancer.In addition,breast cancer patients with both thyroid nodules and uterine fibroids had significantly higher luminal-B than other subtypes.Conclusions:This study demonstrates that breast cancer women have a significantly greater incidence rate of thyroid nodules and uterine fibroids,and is higher at Luminal A or Luminal B.We consider these findings may contribute to the identification of liver channel of foot jueyin following underlying this disease association.

Clinical,Pathological,and Genetic Features of Two Chinese Cases with Filamin C Myopathy

To the Editor:Filamin C (FLNC)myopathy is an autosomal dominant inherited myopathy caused by mutations in FLNC.FLNC belongs to the filamin superfamily and cross-links actin filaments to form a network,anchoring membrane protein to the cytoskeleton. Human protein filamins comprise three isoforms encoded by the human genome:filamins A,B,and C.Among these,FLNC is a Z-disk protein encoded by the FLNC gene and is mainly expressed in the skeletal and cardiac muscles.FLNC gene is on chromosome 7q32-q35,containing genomic DNA of about 29.5 kb length and 49 encoding exons.FLNC is an isoform of serine protease expressed primarily in the striated muscle,containing 2725 amino acids, at a molecular weight of 291,000.FLNC protein contains two domains.The amino terminus consists of two ealponin homology domains that together constitute the actin-binding domain (ABD), followed by 24 filamin-type immunoglobulin (Ig-FLMN)repeated domains (rod-overlapping domains),the most carboxy-terminal of which is responsible for dimerization,assembly,and anchor filaments.