Facile Synthesis of Hierarchical Sulfur Composites for Lithium–Sulfur Batteries

• Published in: ChemElectroChem Vol. 6; no. 9; pp. 2438 - 2447
• Main Authors: Cho, Chuan‐Sheng, Shih, Hsuan‐Ju, Li, Chia‐Chen
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Weinheim John Wiley & Sons, Inc 02-05-2019
• Subjects: Cathodes; Composite materials; Dispersion; electrode dispersion; Electrodes; Ion currents; Li-ion cathode; Lithium; Lithium sulfur batteries; lithium−sulfur batteries; Morphology; Slurries; Sulfur; sulfur composites; Synthesis
• ISSN: 2196-0216; 2196-0216
• DOI: 10.1002/celc.201900399

A facile approach for the synthesis of core–shell composites composed of a commercial sulfur core and a carbon nanopowder shell with different morphologies and sizes is proposed. When these composites are used to prepare a cathode for lithium−sulfur batteries, their fabricated electrode slurries show better dispersion homogeneity than that prepared through the conventional method of simply mixing sulfur and carbon nanopowders. Hence, the resulting cathodes fabricated by using these composites show superior electronic and ionic conductivity compared to that produced through the conventional method. Electrochemical assessment demonstrates that lithium−sulfur batteries fabricated by using the composites show reduced self‐discharge and improved capacity and maintained 100 % of the columbic efficiency. However, these improvements cannot be achieved if the sulfur crystal of the composite is considerably large, as this negatively affects the dispersion of the electrode constituents.
On form: Hierarchical sulfur–carbon composites for use as S electrode materials are synthesized by using a facile approach. The composites are used to improve the electrical conductivity of the S electrode and the cell performance of the constructed lithium‐sulfur (Li−S) batteries.