Amorphous TiO2 nanotube arrays with Au nanocrystals for lithium-ion battery

Wanggang Zhang, Yiming Liu, Zhiyuan Song, Fuqian Yang

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

6 Scopus citations

Abstract

The controllable production of TiO2-based nanostructured composites has attracted great interest for the potential applications in storage energy, catalysis, and photonics. In this work, we demonstrate a facile method to produce amorphous TiO2 nanotube (a-TNT) arrays with Au nanocrystals (Au NCs) anchoring on the outmost surfaces of the a-TNTs (Au@TNT arrays) at room temperature. The spatial distribution of Au NCs along the longitudinal direction of the a-TNT arrays is tunable via the control of the sputtering time of Au. The Li-ion half cells (LIHCs) with the working electrode made from the Au@TNT arrays possess higher specific capacities than those with pure a-TNT arrays and exhibit great rate performance. The LIHCs with the Au@TNT arrays prepared with 60 seconds of the Au sputtering time exhibit the best rate performance and deliver discharge capacities of 320, 291, 286, 135, and 122 mAh·g−1 at current densities of 0.1, 0.5, 1, 5, and 10 A·g−1, respectively. The apparent diffusivity of lithium in the LIHCs increases linearly with the increase of the average size of Au NCs (amount of Au NCs/sputtering time). The results obtained in this work suggest that a-TNTs anchored with metallic nanocrystals have the potential to be anode materials of next-generation lithium-ion battery.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)7578-7589
Number of pages12
JournalInternational Journal of Energy Research
Volume46
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - May 2022

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Keywords

  • Au nanocrystals
  • a-TiO nanotubes
  • diffusivity
  • lithium-ion battery

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment
  • Nuclear Energy and Engineering
  • Fuel Technology
  • Energy Engineering and Power Technology

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