Operando Characterization of Cathodic Reactions in a Liquid-state Lithium-oxygen Micro-battery by Scanning Transmission Electron Microscopy

Overview

Journal Sci Rep

Specialty Science

Date 2018 Feb 18

PMID 29453422

Authors

Pan Liu

Jiuhui Han

Xianwei Guo

Yoshikazu Ito

Chuchu Yang

Shoucong Ning

Takeshi Fujita

Akihiko Hirata

Mingwei Chen

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Rechargeable non-aqueous lithium-oxygen batteries with a large theoretical capacity are emerging as a high-energy electrochemical device for sustainable energy strategy. Despite many efforts made to understand the fundamental Li-O electrochemistry, the kinetic process of cathodic reactions, associated with the formation and decomposition of a solid LiO phase during charging and discharging, remains debate. Here we report direct visualization of the charge/discharge reactions on a gold cathode in a non-aqueous lithium-oxygen micro-battery using liquid-cell aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) combining with synchronized electrochemical measurements. The real-time and real-space characterization by time-resolved STEM reveals the electrochemical correspondence of discharge/charge overpotentials to the nucleation, growth and decomposition of LiO at a constant current density. The nano-scale operando observations would enrich our knowledge on the underlying reaction mechanisms of lithium-oxygen batteries during round-trip discharging and charging and shed lights on the strategies in improving the performances of lithium-oxygen batteries by tailoring the cathodic reactions.

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