title: Carbon-Coated Honeycomb Ni-Mn-Co-O Inverse Opal: A High Capacity Ternary Transition Metal Oxide Anode for Li-ion Batteries.
abstract: We present the formation of a carbon-coated honeycomb ternary Ni-Mn-Co-O inverse opal as a conversion mode anode material for Li-ion battery applications. In order to obtain high capacity via conversion mode reactions, a single phase crystalline honeycombed IO structure of Ni-Mn-Co-O material was first formed. This Ni-Mn-Co-O IO converts via reversible redox reactions and Li2O formation to a 3D structured matrix assembly of nanoparticles of three (MnO, CoO and NiO) oxides, that facilitates efficient reactions with Li. A carbon coating maintains the structure without clogging the open-worked IO pore morphology for electrolyte penetration and mass transport of products during cycling. The highly porous IO was compared in a Li-ion half-cell to nanoparticles of the same material and showed significant improvement in specific capacity and capacity retention. Further optimization of the system was investigated by incorporating a vinylene carbonate additive into the electrolyte solution which boosted performance, offering promising high-rate performance and good capacity retention over extended cycling. The analysis confirms the possibility of creating a ternary transition metal oxide material with binder free accessible open-worked structure to allow three conversion mode oxides to efficiently cycle as an anode material for Li-ion battery applications.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University College Cork, Cork T12 YN60, Ireland.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: McNulty
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University College Cork, Cork T12 YN60, Ireland.
authors.forename: Hugh
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Geaney
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University College Cork, Cork T12 YN60, Ireland.|Micro-Nano Systems Centre, Tyndall National Institute, Lee Maltings, Cork T12 R5CP, Ireland.
authors.forename: Colm
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: O'Dwyer