X-ray Research May Open Door to Lithium-Sulfur Batteries

July 19, 201212 years ago slac 4 Comments

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The Stanford-SLAC study could open new avenues of research that could improve the performance of lithium-sulfur batteries, said co-author Michael Toney, head of the Materials Sciences Division at SLAC’s Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource.

“Our study demonstrates the importance of using high-power X-ray technologies to study batteries while they are operating,” Toney said. “From an engineering standpoint, it’s valuable to know that relying on standard electron microscopy to test the fidelity of materials may give you deceptive results.”

Several research labs are looking for new ways to trap polysulfides on the cathode. A variety of techniques have shown promise, including novel electrolytes and carbon nanotubes coated with sulfur.

But the polysulfide problem might not be as daunting as previous studies suggest.

“We found that very few of the polysulfides went into the electrolyte,” Nelson said. “The carbon-sulfur cathode actually trapped them better than expected. But even a small amount of polysulfides will cause the battery to fail within 10 cycles. If scientists want to improve the cycle life of the battery, they need to prevent virtually all of the polysulfides from leaking into the electrolyte. If they really want to know what’s going on inside the battery, they can’t just use standard analysis. They need a technology that tells the whole story.”

Image - Two SLAC scientists working on an SSRL beamline — Senior staff scientist Mike Toney and postdoc Johanna Nelson inspect the transmission X-ray microscope at SLAC’s Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, a powerful device that takes nano-scale images of chemical reactions in batteries while they are running.

In addition to Nelson, the co-lead authors of the JACS study are SLAC postdoctoral researcher Sumohan Misra and Stanford doctoral student Yuan Yang.

The study is also co-authored by Yi Cui, an associate professor of materials science and engineering at Stanford and of photon science at SLAC; Hongjie Dai, a professor of chemistry at Stanford; graduate students Ariel Jackson and Hailiang Wang of Stanford; and Joy C. Andrews, a staff scientist at SLAC.

The research was supported by the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense and a Stanford Graduate Fellowship. SLAC is a national laboratory operated by Stanford for the DOE. The study was conducted in cooperation with the Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Science, a Stanford-SLAC research partnership.

Source: Mark Shwartz, Precourt Institute for Energy at Stanford University

X-ray Images of Sulfur Particles via Johanna Nelson et al. Video via Stanford News Service.

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