Efficient Sodium Storage in Rolled-Up Amorphous Si Nanomembranes

Shaozhuan Huang; Lixiang Liu; Yun Zheng; Ye Wang; Dezhi Kong; Yingmeng Zhang; Yumeng Shi; Lin Zhang; Oliver G Schmidt; Hui Ying Yang

doi:10.1002/adma.201706637

Efficient Sodium Storage in Rolled-Up Amorphous Si Nanomembranes

Adv Mater. 2018 May;30(20):e1706637. doi: 10.1002/adma.201706637. Epub 2018 Mar 30.

Authors

Shaozhuan Huang¹, Lixiang Liu², Yun Zheng³, Ye Wang¹, Dezhi Kong¹, Yingmeng Zhang^{1

4}, Yumeng Shi⁴, Lin Zhang⁵, Oliver G Schmidt², Hui Ying Yang¹

Affiliations

¹ Pillar of Engineering Product Development, Singapore University of Technology and Design, 8 Somapah Road, Singapore, 487372, Singapore.
² Institute for Integrative Nanosciences, Leibniz Institute for Solid State and Materials Research Dresden, Helmholtzstraße 20, Dresden, 01069, Germany.
³ School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Avenue, Singapore, 639798, Singapore.
⁴ International Collaborative Laboratory of 2D Materials for Optoelectronic Science & Technology of Ministry of Education, Engineering Technology Research Center for 2D Material Information Function Devices and Systems of Guangdong Province, College of Optoelectronic Engineering, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, 518060, China.
⁵ Institute for Solid State Physics, Leibniz Universität Hannover, Appelstraße 2, Hannover, 30167, Germany.

PMID: 29603455
DOI: 10.1002/adma.201706637

Abstract

Alloying-type materials are promising anodes for high-performance sodium-ion batteries (SIBs) because of their high capacities and low Na-ion insertion potentials. However, the typical candidates, such as P, Sn, Sb, and Pb, suffer from severe volume changes (≈293-487%) during the electrochemical reactions, leading to inferior cycling performances. Here, a high-rate and ultrastable alloying-type anode based on the rolled-up amorphous Si nanomembranes is demonstrated. The rolled-up amorphous Si nanomembranes show a very small volume change during the sodiation/desodiation processes and deliver an excellent rate capability and ultralong cycle life up to 2000 cycles with 85% capacity retention. The structural evolution and pseudocapacitance contribution are investigated by using the ex situ characterization techniques combined with kinetics analysis. Furthermore, the mechanism of efficient sodium-ion storage in amorphous Si is kinetically analyzed through an illustrative atomic structure with dangling bonds, offering a new perspective on understanding the sodium storage behavior. These results suggest that nanostructured amorphous Si is a promising anode material for high-performance SIBs.

Keywords: alloying-type anode materials; amorphous Si nanomembranes; dangling bonds; pseudocapacitance contributions; sodium storage mechanisms; sodium-ion batteries.