Sucrose pyrolysis assembling carbon nanotubes on graphite felt using for vanadium redox flow battery positive electrode

In the present paper, multi-walled carbon nanotubes（MWCNTs） are successfully assembled on graphite felt（GF） using sucrose pyrolysis method for the first time. The in situ formed pyrolytic carbon is chosen as the binder because it is essentially carbon materials as well as CNTs and GF which has a natural tendency to achieve high bonding strength and low contact resistance. The MWCNTs/GF electrode is demonstrated to increase surface area, reduce polarization, lower charge transfer resistance and improve energy conversion efficiency comparing with GF. This excellent electrochemical performance is mainly ascribed to the high electro-catalytic activity of MWCNTs and increasing surface area.

New layered metal oxides as positive electrode materials for room-temperature sodium-ion batteries

In order to achieve better Na storage performance, most layered oxide positive electrode materials contain toxic and expensive transition metals Ni and/or Co, which are also widely used for lithium-ion batteries. Here we report a new quaternary layered oxide consisting of Cu, Fe, Mn, and Ti transition metals with O3-type oxygen stacking as a positive electrode for room-temperature sodium-ion batteries. The material can be simply prepared by a high-temperature solidstate reaction route and delivers a reversible capacity of 94 m Ah/g with an average storage voltage of 3.2 V. This paves the way for cheaper and non-toxic batteries with high Na storage performance.

A comparative study on the reactivity of charged Ni-rich and Ni-poor positive electrodes with electrolyte at elevated temperatures using accelerating rate calorimetry

The reactivity between charged Li(Li_(0.115)Mn_(0.529)Ni_(0.339)Al_(0.017))O_(2)(Li-rich),single crystal Li(Ni_(0.8)Mn_(0.1)Co_(0.1))O_(2)(SC-NMC811),LiFePO_(4)(LFP) and LiMn_(0.8)Fe_(0.2)PO_(4)(LMFP) positive electrodes at different states of charge(SOCs) and traditional carbonate-based electrolyte at elevated temperatures is systematically studied using accelerating rate calorimetry(ARC).The results show that the SOC greatly affects the thermal stability of the Li-rich and SC-NMC811 when traditional carbonate-based electrolyte is used.Although an increase in the SOC increases the energy density of lithium-ion cells,it also increases the reactivity between charged Li-rich and SC-NMC811 samples with electrolyte at elevated temperatures.In comparison with SC-NMC811,the Li-rich samples are much more stable at elevated temperatures,and the latter have higher specific capacity.SC-NMC811 samples are less reactive than traditional polycrystalline NMC811.Both LFP and LMFP samples show excellent thermal stability at elevated temperatures.The substitution of Fe by Mn in the olivine series positive materials does not impact the reactivity with electrolyte.

Stable wide-temperature and low volume expansion Al batteries:Integrating few-layer graphene with multifunctional cobalt boride nanocluster as positive electrode

To achieve stable positive electrode for promoting the overall electrochemical performance of Al batteries(ABs),here novel cobalt boride(CoB)nanoclusters are synthesized to construct composite electrodes with few-layer graphene(FLG).Due to the presence of amorphous channels in the employed CoB nanoclusters,the ABs with FLG/CoB composite positive electrodes exhibit high rate.capability and both mechanical and electrochemical stability in the ABs.With assistance of in situ scanning electron microscopy(SEM),the observation results suggest that the positive electrode of CoB nanoclusters holds almost ignorable volume variation upon electrochemical processes,which substantially alleviates the massive electrode expansion induced by the anion intercalation in the composite positive electrode.Interestingly,the composite positive electrodes provide stable reversible energy storage capability within a broadened temperature range(-30-60℃),promising a novel strategy to design advanced ABs positive electrodes with enhanced overall energy storage performance.

Response of the low-pressure hot-filament discharge plasma to a positively biased auxiliary disk electrode

In a steady-state plasma,the loss rate of plasma particles to the chamber wall and surfaces in contact with plasma is balanced by the ionization rate of background neutrals in the hot-filament discharges.The balance between the loss rate and ionization rate of plasma particles(electrons and ions)maintains quasi-neutrality of the bulk plasma.In the presence of an external perturbation,it tries to retain its quasi-neutrality condition.In this work,we studied how the properties of bulk plasma are affected by an external DC potential perturbation.An auxiliary biased metal disk electrode was used to introduce a potential perturbation to the plasma medium.A single Langmuir probe and an emissive probe,placed in the line of the discharge axis,were used for the characterization of the bulk plasma.It is observed that only positive bias to the auxiliary metal disk increases the plasma potential,electron temperature,and plasma density but these plasma parameters remain unaltered when the disk is biased with a negative potential with respect to plasma potential.The observed plasma parameters for two different-sized,positively as well as negatively biased,metal disks are compared and found inconsistent with the existing theoretical model at large positive bias voltages.The role of the primary energetic electrons population in determining the plasma parameters is discussed.The experimentally observed results are qualitatively explained on the basis of electrostatic confinement arising due to the loss of electrons to a biased metal disk electrode.

Hierarchical N-doped porous carbon hosts for stabilizing tellurium in promoting Al-Te batteries

Aluminum batteries are attractive in electrochemical energy storage due to high energy density and lowcost aluminum,while the energy density is limited for the lack of favorable positive electrode materials to match aluminum negative electrodes.Tellurium positive electrode is intrinsically electrically conductive among chalcogen and holds high theoretical specific capacity(1260.27 mAh g^(-1)) and discharge voltage plateau(~1,5 V).However,the chemical and electrochemical dissolution of Te active materials results in the low material utilization and poor cycling stability.To enhance the electrochemical performance,herein a nitrogen doped porous carbon(N-PC) is derived from zeolite imidazolate framework(ZIF-67)as an effective tellurium host to suppress the undesired shuttle effect.In order to inhibit the volume expansion of N-PC during the charge/discharge process,the reduced graphene oxide(rGO) nanosheets are introduced to form a stable host materials(N-PC-rGO) for stabilizing Te.The physical encapsulation and chemical confinement to soluble tellurium species are achieved.N-PC-rGO-Te positive electrode exhibits an improved initial specific capacity and long-term cycling performance at a current density of 500 mA g^(-1)(initial specific capacity:935.5 mAh g^(-1);after 150 cycles:467.5 mAh g^(-1)), highlighting a promising design strategy for inhibiting chemical and electrochemical dissolution of Te.

Mechanism of Nickel-Aluminium Alloy Electroplating

The effect of operating conditions on the aluminium content of Ni-Al alloy deposit and the catalytic function of NaF on electrodeposition in the nonaqueous solution containing aluminium are investigated.The results indicate that the plated aluminuim content will be increased with the rise of current density in a given range.When the current density is 2.5A/dm 2,nickle aluminium alloy containing 13.1 wt% aluminium will be deposited.The plated aluminium content will be increased by 2wt% as 0.1mol/L NaF is added to the bath.

Revealing the anion intercalation behavior and surface evolution of graphite in dual-ion batteries via in situ AFM

Graphite as a positive electrode material of dual ion batteries(DIBs)has attracted tremendous attentions for its advantages including low lost,high working voltage and high energy density.However,very few literatures regarding to the real-time observation of anion intercalation behavior and surface evolution of graphite in DIBs have been reported.Herein,we use in situ atomic force microscope(AFM)to directly observe the intercalation/de-intercalation processes of PF6^-in graphite in real time.First,by measuring the change in the distance between graphene layers during intercalation,we found that PF6^-intercalates in one of every three graphite layers and the intercalation speed is measured to be 2μm-min^-1.Second,graphite will wrinke and suffer structural damnages at high voltages,along with severe electrolyte decomposition on the surface.These findings provide useful information for further optimizing the capacity and the stability of graphite anode in DIBs.