Owing to high specific energy, low cost, and environmental friendliness, lithium–sulfur (Li–S) batteries hold great promise to meet the increasing demand for advanced energy storage beyond portable electronics, and to mitigate environmental problems. However, the application of Li–S batteries is challenged by several obstacles, including their short life and low sulfur utilization, which become more serious when sulfur loading is increased to the practically accepted level above 3–5 mg cm−2. More and more efforts have been made recently to overcome the barriers toward commercially viable Li–S batteries with a high sulfur loading. This review highlights the recent progress in high-sulfur-loading Li–S batteries enabled by hierarchical design principles at multiscale. Particularly, basic insights into the interfacial reactions, strategies for mesoscale assembly, unique architectures, and configurational innovation in the cathode, anode, and separator are under specific concerns. Hierarchy in the multiscale design is proposed to guide the future development of high-sulfur-loading Li–S batteries.

Review on High-Loading and High-Energy Lithium–Sulfur Batteries

Ionic liquids (ILs) are liquids consisting entirely of ions and can be further defined as molten salts having melting points lower than 100 °C. One of the most important research areas for IL utilization is undoubtedly their energy application, especially for energy storage and conversion materials and devices, because there is a continuously increasing demand for clean and sustainable energy. In this article, various application of ILs are reviewed by focusing on their use as electrolyte materials for Li/Na ion batteries, Li-sulfur batteries, Li-oxygen batteries, and nonhumidified fuel cells and as carbon precursors for electrode catalysts of fuel cells and electrode materials for batteries and supercapacitors. Due to their characteristic properties such as nonvolatility, high thermal stability, and high ionic conductivity, ILs appear to meet the rigorous demands/criteria of these various applications. However, for further development, specific applications for which these characteristic properties becom...

Application of Ionic Liquids to Energy Storage and Conversion Materials and Devices

The lithium-sulfur battery is a compelling energy storage system because its high theoretical energy density exceeds Li-ion batteries at much lower cost, but applications are thwarted by capacity decay caused by the polysulfide shuttle. Here, proof of concept and the critical metrics of a strategy to entrap polysulfides within the sulfur cathode by their reaction to form a surface-bound active redox mediator are demonstrated. It is shown through a combination of surface spectroscopy and cyclic voltammetry studies that only materials with redox potentials in a targeted window react with polysulfides to form active surface-bound polythionate species. These species are directly correlated to superior Li-S cell performance by electrochemical studies of high surface area oxide cathodes with redox potentials below, above, and within this window. Optimized Li-S cells yield a very low fade rate of 0.048% per cycle. The insight gained into the fundamental surface mechanism and its correlation to the stability of the electrochemical cell provides a bridge between mechanistic understanding and battery performance essential for the design of high performance Li-S cells.

Tuning Transition Metal Oxide–Sulfur Interactions for Long Life Lithium Sulfur Batteries: The “Goldilocks” Principle

Ionic liquids (ILs) have been widely investigated as novel solvents, electrolytes, and soft functional materials. Nevertheless, the widespread applications of ILs in most cases have been hampered by their liquid state. The confinement of ILs into nanoporous hosts is a simple but versatile strategy to overcome this problem. Nanoconfined ILs constitute a new class of composites with the intrinsic chemistries of ILs and the original functions of solid matrices. The interplay between these two components, particularly the confinement effect and the interactions between ILs and pore walls, further endows ILs with significantly distinct physicochemical properties in the restricted space compared to the corresponding bulk systems. The aim of this article is to provide a comprehensive review of nanoconfined ILs. After a brief introduction of bulk ILs, the synthetic strategies and investigation methods for nanoconfined ILs are documented. The local structure and physicochemical properties of ILs in diverse porous ...

Nanoconfined Ionic Liquids

The ever-growing demand for advanced energy storage devices in portable electronics, electric vehicles and large scale power grids has triggered intensive research efforts over the past decade on lithium and sodium batteries. The key to improve their electrochemical performance and enhance the service safety lies in the development of advanced electrode, electrolyte, and auxiliary materials. Ionic liquids (ILs) are liquids consisting entirely of ions near room temperature, and are characterized by many unique properties such as ultralow volatility, high ionic conductivity, good thermal stability, low flammability, a wide electrochemical window, and tunable polarity and basicity/acidity. These properties create the possibilities of designing batteries with excellent safety, high energy/power density and long-term stability, and also provide better ways to synthesize known materials. IL-derived materials, such as poly(ionic liquids), ionogels and IL-tethered nanoparticles, retain most of the characteristics of ILs while being endowed with other favourable features, and thus they have received a great deal of attention as well. This review provides a comprehensive review of the various applications of ILs and derived materials in lithium and sodium batteries including Li/Na-ion, dual-ion, Li/Na-S and Li/Na-air (O2) batteries, with a particular emphasis on recent advances in the literature. Their unique characteristics enable them to serve as advanced resources, medium, or ingredient for almost all the components of batteries, including electrodes, liquid electrolytes, solid electrolytes, artificial solid-electrolyte interphases, and current collectors. Some thoughts on the emerging challenges and opportunities are also presented in this review for further development.

Ionic liquids and derived materials for lithium and sodium batteries

The present invention relates to a process for preparing mesoporous materials comprising the following steps in the sequence of a-b-c-d: (a) providing at least one dispersion of metal oxide nanoparticles (A) in a solvent (C) and at least one block copolymer (B) and optionally a solid substrate (S), (b) combining the at least one dispersion of metal oxide nanoparticles (A) with the at least one block copolymer (B), (c) removing the solvent (C) thus yielding a composite material (K), and (d) removing the at least one copolymer (B) from said composite material (K), wherein the block copolymer (B) comprises at least one alkylene oxide block (AO) and at least one isobutylene block (IB). The present invention further relates to mesoporous materials thus obtainable, and to their use as an electrode material, in electronic components, sensors, and dye-sensitized solar cells. The present invention finally relates to electronic components and dye-sensitized solar cells comprising the mesoporous materials.

Process for preparing mesoporous materials

Cette invention concerne un procede de fabrication de materiaux mesoporeux comprenant les operations suivantes, dans l'ordre a-b-c-d : (a) utilisation d'au moins une dispersion de nanoparticules d'oxyde de metal (A) dans un solvant (C), d'au moins un copolymere bloc (B) et eventuellement d'un substrat (S) solide; (b) combinaison de la ou des dispersions de nanoparticules d'oxyde de metal (A) et du ou des copolymeres blocs (B); extraction du solvant (C) pour obtenir un materiau composite (K); et (d) extraction du ou des copolymeres blocs (B) dudit materiau composite (K), le copolymere bloc (B) comprenant au moins un bloc d'oxyde d'alkylene (AO) et au moins un bloc d'isobutylene (IB). De plus, cette invention concerne des materiaux mesoporeux pouvant etre obtenus de cette maniere et leur utilisation comme materiau d'electrode dans des composants electroniques, capteurs et cellules solaires a pigment photosensible. Enfin, la presente invention concerne des composants electroniques et des cellules solaires a pigment photosensible comprenant les materiaux mesoporeux.

Procédé de fabrication de matériaux mésoporeux

We describe the preparation of turbostratic carbon in monolithic form by silica template method and its use as host matrix to trap polysulfides in Li–S batteries. The synthesized ionic liquid-derived carbon is hierarchically structured with pore size maxima around 6 nm and 750 nm, and it has a room temperature electrical conductivity of 7–8 S cm–1, owing to a high content of pyridinic and graphitic nitrogen. Further, this carbon can accommodate up to ∼80% sulfur by weight, and the resulting nanocomposite demonstrates promising performance as novel electrode material for Li–S batteries. Cathodes with low areal mass loading (1 mgsulfur cm–2) can be cycled at C/5 and 1C over several hundreds of cycles with low polarization and very little capacity fading (4% between the fifth and 1000th cycles at 1C). Highly loaded cathodes (4 mgsulfur cm–2) also exhibit good cyclability at C/5 with areal capacities of 2.6 mAh cm–2 on average over 200 cycles. Yet the high capacities make the cells more prone to electrolyte d...

Ionic Liquid-Derived Nitrogen-Enriched Carbon/Sulfur Composite Cathodes with Hierarchical Microstructure—A Step Toward Durable High-Energy and High-Performance Lithium–Sulfur Batteries

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Process for preparing mesoporous materials

Procédé de fabrication de matériaux mésoporeux

Ionic Liquid-Derived Nitrogen-Enriched Carbon/Sulfur Composite Cathodes with Hierarchical Microstructure—A Step Toward Durable High-Energy and High-Performance Lithium–Sulfur Batteries