Carbon-coated BiOBr composite prepared by molten salt method and mechanical ball milling as anode material for lithium-ion batteries

doi:10.1016/j.inoche.2020.108415

Inorganic Chemistry Communications

Volume 125, March 2021, 108415

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.inoche.2020.108415 Get rights and content

Highlights

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The BiOBr nanoplates were prepared by low temperature molten salt process.
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The BiOBr@C composite exhibits superior electrochemical performance.
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The BiOBr@C composite delivers charge capacity of 420 mAhg⁻¹ after 100 cycles at 100 mAg⁻¹.

Abstract

In this paper, carbon-coated BiOBr composite (BiOBr@C) is obtained through simple molten salt method using Bi(NO₃)₃ $∙$ 5H₂O and KBr in fused LiNO₃-KNO₃ eutectic salt combined with ball milling. The as-prepared samples were characterized by X-ray diffraction, Scanning electron microscope and Transmission electron microscope. Compared with pure BiOBr, electrochemical tests showed that the BiOBr@C composite electrode has been significantly enhanced by composite with ketjen black. It delivers a reversible capacity of 422 mAh g⁻¹ after 100 cycles at 100 mA g⁻¹. Similarly, the BiOBr@C composite also exhibits excellent rate performance with the reversible capacity of 380 mAh g⁻¹ at a current density of 400 mA g⁻¹.

Graphical abstract

Introduction

Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) have been extensively used in the energy storage system and power-driven system [1], [2], including portable devices, electric vehicles, aerospace, etc. As we all know, commercial graphite anode has safety problem in the case of high current charge-discharge [3]. Therefore, it is urgent to develop novel materials with high lithiation-delithiation potential. Bismuth-based anode materials have relatively high working potential and theoretical specific capacity (ca.3800 mAh cm⁻³, Li₃Bi), which has aroused great interest [4], [5]. In recent years, layered-structured BiOX (X = F, Cl, Br, I) compounds have been successfully synthesized by different methods for metal-ion secondary battery. For example, Wang et al. prepared BiOF nanosheets with a thickness of 80 nm by a solvothermal method [6]. Ye synthesized flake BiOCl and BiOBr with different widths and thicknesses by hydrothermal method [7]. Chen obtained layered-structured BiOI nanosheets by direct thermal treatment of commercial BiI₃ powder in air [8]. However, the preparation of BiOBr nanoplates by molten salt method for LIBs has been rarely reported. The molten salt method is one of the general and rapid synthesis of simple and complex compounds [9], [10], [11]. Different molten salts affect the morphology and electrochemical properties of the target products. Owing to their low cost and, most importantly, their low melting point, alkali metal nitrates are often selected as a medium for the synthesis of solid materials [12], [13], [14]. In this communication, the BiOBr@C composite is prepared in molten LiNO₃-KNO₃ medium followed by mechanical ball milling, and investigated for lithium-ion battery anode.

Section snippets

Materials synthesis

BiOBr nanoplates were synthesized by a facile molten salt reaction. Bi(NO₃)₃ $∙$ 5H₂O, KBr, LiNO₃ and KNO₃ were grinded in an agate mortar for 30 min with mole ratio of 1: 3: 10: 10. Then the mixture was transferred to the chamber electric furnace with heating at 350 °C for 3 h. After cooling to room temperature, the reactants were washed thoroughly with distilled water to remove the excess lithium and potassium salts completely from the product, and placed in a vacuum drying chamber at 90 °C

Results and discussion

To investigate the crystal structure of synthesized BiOBr and BiOBr@C composite, ex-situ XRD was firstly carried out. As shown in Fig. 1, all the diffraction peaks are well indexed as JCPDS card (PDF#09-0393, space group: P4/nmm), indicating that BiOBr and BiOBr@C samples prepared by the molten salt method has good crystalline. In addition, no characteristic diffraction peak of carbon was observed, indicating that it existed in an amorphous state in the composite [15].

The SEM images are

Conclusion

In summary, carbon-coated BiOBr composite is obtained through simple molten salt method combined with ball milling. In contrast to BiOBr, BiOBr@C composite exhibits the higher retention capacity (422 mAh g⁻¹) at a current density of 100 mA g⁻¹ after 100 cycles. The excellent electrochemical performance of BiOBr@C composite is due to nanoplates that can provide fast channels of electron and ion transportation, thus promoting the permeation of electrolyte. Furthermore, the carbon layers

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Xiaoxiao Shi: Conceptualization, Methodology. Haohao Liu: Data curation, Writing - original draft. Jianxin Tian: Investigation. Pengfei Ning: Visualization. Jianyin Zhang: Supervision, Writing - review & editing. Xingwei Shi: Writing - review & editing.

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgments

Financial supports from the Natural Science Foundation of Modern College of Humanities and Sciences, Shanxi Normal University (2020JCYJ18), the Doctoral fund of Shanxi Normal University (0505/02070305).

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Bismuth (Bi) based compounds are promising negative materials in aqueous alkali batteries (AABs) for the 3-electron redox chemistry of Bi element within low potentials, the exploration of new Bi-based negative materials is still a meaningful work in this field. Herein, a hierarchical bismuthyl bromide (BiOBr) microspheres material assembled by laminas was prepared via solvothermal reaction and attempted as negative battery material for AAB. The pronounced redox reactions of Bi species in low potential enable high battery capacity, and the porous texture with high hydrophilicity facilitates diffusion of OH^– and participation in faradaic reactions. When used as negative battery electrode, the BiOBr could offer decent specific capacity (C_s, 190 mAh g⁻¹ at 1 A g⁻¹), rate capability (C_s remained to 163 mAh g⁻¹ at 8 A g⁻¹) and cycleability (85% C_s retention after 1000 charge–discharge cycles). The AAB based on BiOBr negative electrode could export an energy density (E_cell) of 61.5 Wh kg⁻¹ at power density (P_cell) of 558 W kg⁻¹ and good cycleability. The current work showcases valuable application expansion of a traditional BiOBr photocatalyst in battery typed charge storage.
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At present, it is very important to synthesize new high-capacity anode materials for lithium-ion batteries by simple method. This study describes the successful preparation of (BiO)₂CO₃@C composites from commercial (BiO)₂CO₃ and carbon material via a straightforward mechanical ball milling technique. When tested for lithium-ion half-cell, the results showed that (BiO)₂CO₃@ketjen black composite exhibited obviously enhanced electrochemical performances than the original (BiO)₂CO₃ and other (BiO)₂CO₃@C composites. Furthermore, the (BiO)₂CO₃@ketjen black composite electrode also showed satisfactory long cycle life test, with a charging capacity of 575 mAh g⁻¹ after 750 cycles with a current density of 200 mA g⁻¹ and displaying good capacity retention (96.5% of the initial capacity). These results indicate that (BiO)₂CO₃@ketjen black composite prepared by one-pot mechanical ball grinding is promising to be used in the next generation of lithium-ion batteries.
Extraordinary electrochemical performance of lithium–sulfur battery with 2D ultrathin BiOBr/rGO sheet as an efficient sulfur host
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Citation Excerpt :
As metallic elements have adsorption and catalytic effect on LiPSs, the modification method for loading metal compounds on rGO has attracted great attention to improve electrochemical performance [19–21]. Among many metal compounds, BiOBr has attracted our interest because of its cheap, non-toxic and chemically stable, which consists of alternating Br- and [Bi2O22-] layers, and such structure not only induces the separation of electron–hole pairs, but also is conducive to the fabrication of composite materials with special structure [22–24]. This unique layered structure can also furnish fast ion/electron diffusion channel along the ionic layers.
There are many challenges such as the shuttling effect of soluble lithium polysulfides species (LiPSs) and the slow solid-state conversion between Li₂S₄ and Li₂S in the development process of lithium-sulfur battery (LSB), so it is vital how to design and fabricate sulfur hosts with strong adsorption and good electrocatalysis. In this work, BiOBr in-situ forms onto both sides of reduced graphene oxide (rGO) to obtain a novel ultrathin BiOBr/rGO sheet, then self-constructing a hydrogel cylinder in shape, via a one-step hydrothermal process. The BiOBr/rGO composite with sandwich structure not only shows the outstanding adsorption effect on LiPSs, resulting from a strong bonding interaction between BiOBr/rGO and Li₂S₆ demonstrated by XPS technique, but also exhibits the extraordinary electrocatalytic performance on both the LiPSs conversion reaction in cyclic voltammetry experiment of symmetric cell and the Li₂S nucleation process in potentiostatic deposited experiment, which will significantly improve the electrochemical performance of LSB. The S@BiOBr/rGO electrodes deliver the superior capacity and long cyclic stability with 882.2 mA h g⁻¹ at 0.5 C after 1000 cycles, as well as displays the excellent rate performance with 823.9, 692.6 and 554.2 mA h g⁻¹ at 1 C, 3 C and 5 C, respectively, after 400 cycles. Even though the sulfur loading reaches 4.9 mg cm⁻¹, the reversible specific capacity of 424.6 mA h g^-1can be maintained at 0.5 C after 400 cycles. Based on the in-situ X-ray diffraction and in-situ Raman spectroscopy, it could be revealed that the initial discharge process of active sulfur on the BiOBr/rGO cathode is α-S₈ → Li₂S₈ → Li₂S₆ → Li₂S₃ → Li₂S₂ → Li₂S, while the charging progress is the corresponding reverse reaction, but the final substance is β-S₈. This research not only shows that the two-dimensional ultrathin BiOBr/rGO hybrid is successfully developed in LSB with excellent electrochemical performances, but also provides a strategy for exploring the construction of sulfur host materials.
Construction of Z-scheme heterojunction by coupling Bi<inf>2</inf>Sn<inf>2</inf>O<inf>7</inf> and BiOBr with abundant oxygen vacancies: Enhanced photodegradation performance and mechanism insight
2022, Journal of Colloid and Interface Science
Citation Excerpt :
Despite these advantages, the use of BiOBr in photocatalysis still faces many challenges, such as insufficient separation efficiency and weak oxidation or reduction ability. Many approaches have been used to make up for these weaknesses of the BiOBr such as building heterojunctions [8], noble-metal deposition [9], and carbon modification [10]. Constructing heterojunctions of BiOBr with another semiconductor having an appropriate band gap is a very feasible strategy to enhance its photocatalytic activity.
Promoting charge migration and enhancing redox ability of photogenerated carriers are important for the development of highly efficient semiconductor-based photocatalyst. Here, BiOBr/Bi₂Sn₂O₇ heterojunction with oxygen vacancies (OVs) was constructed by homogeneously depositing Bi₂Sn₂O₇ nanoparticles on the Vo-BiOBr surface. The experimental results manifested that Vo-BiOBr/Bi₂Sn₂O₇ displayed better performance for rhodamine B, ciprofloxacin, and tetracycline degradation than counterparts without OVs. The characterization results proved OVs played the essential role for enhanced performance via improving the separation efficiency of charge carriers, increasing the visible light harvest, and lowering conduction band position. Moreover, mechanism study revealed that an inner electric field was built at the interface, leading to a Z-scheme path of photogenerated electron. This study provided an efficient strategy for designing highly efficient photocatalyst for solving environmental pollution.
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2021, Chemosphere
Citation Excerpt :
In recent years, bismuth-based semiconductor materials have gained significant attention for wastewater treatment due to their excellent optical response and remarkable photo-oxidation ability (Natarajan et al., 2016; Xu et al., 2019a; Bardos et al., 2020; Cai et al., 2020). Amongst bismuth-based photocatalysts, bismuth oxyhalides (BiOX) have been widely studied as promising photocatalysts for water treatment owing to their tunable band gap values of bismuth oxyiodide (BiOI, ~1.77 eV), bismuth oxychloride (BiOCl, ~3.22 eV), and bismuth oxybromide (BiOBr, ~2.64 eV) (Tekin et al., 2018; Wang et al., 2015, 2020bib_Wang_et_al_2015; Wu et al., 2019bib_Wang_et_al_2020; Yang et al., 2021; Shi et al., 2021; Long et al., 2021). Moreover, BiOX belongs to a class of V-VI-VII ternary oxide materials with a tetragonal matlockite structure and layer structures of [Bi–O] slabs divided by double slabs of a halogen atom as shown in Fig. 1.
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¹: These authors contributed equally to this paper.

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Short communicationCarbon-coated BiOBr composite prepared by molten salt method and mechanical ball milling as anode material for lithium-ion batteries

Highlights

Abstract

Graphical abstract

Introduction

Section snippets

Materials synthesis

Results and discussion

Conclusion

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Declaration of Competing Interest

Acknowledgments

Energy Storage Mater.

J. Power Sources

J. Power Sources

Coordin. Chem. Rev.

Mater. Lett.

Carbon

Appl. Catal. B-Environ.

Ceram. Int.

J. Power Sources

Electrochim. Acta

J. Mater. Chem. A

Sci. Rep.

Short communication
Carbon-coated BiOBr composite prepared by molten salt method and mechanical ball milling as anode material for lithium-ion batteries