Enhanced Cycle Stability of Zinc Sulfide Anode for High-Performance Lithium-Ion Storage: Effect of Conductive Hybrid Matrix on Active ZnS

GeTe-TiC-C Composite Anodes for Li-Ion Storage

Germanium boasts a high charge capacity, but it has detrimental effects on battery cycling life, owing to the significant volume expansion that it incurs after repeated recharging. Therefore, the fabrication of Ge composites including other elements is essential to overcome this hurdle. Herein, highly conductive Te is employed to prepare an alloy of germanium telluride (GeTe) with the addition of a highly conductive matrix comprising titanium carbide (TiC) and carbon (C) via high-energy ball milling (HEBM). The final alloy composite, GeTe-TiC-C, is used as a potential anode for lithium-ion cells. The GeTe-TiC-C composites having different combinations of TiC are characterized by electron microscopies and X-ray powder diffraction for structural and morphological analyses, which indicate that GeTe and TiC are evenly spread out in the carbon matrix. The GeTe electrode exhibits an unstable cycling life; however, the addition of higher amounts of TiC in GeTe offers much better electrochemical performance. Specifically, the GeTe-TiC (20%)-C and GeTe-TiC (30%)-C electrodes exhibited excellent reversible cyclability equivalent to 847 and 614 mAh g⁻¹ after 400 cycles, respectively. Moreover, at 10 A g⁻¹, stable capacity retentions of 78% for GeTe-TiC (20%)-C and 82% for GeTe-TiC (30%)-C were demonstrated. This proves that the developed GeTe-TiC-C anodes are promising for potential applications as anode candidates for high-performance lithium-ion batteries.

Surface defect engineering of mesoporous Cu/ZnS nanocrystal-linked networks for improved visible-light photocatalytic hydrogen production

Cu-doped ZnS nanocrystal-linked mesoporous frameworks possessing suitable electronic energy levels, strong visible-light absorption and large porosity with a low defective surface show efficient photocatalytic H₂ evolution activity from water splitting.