Stabilizing Zinc Anodes by a Cotton Towel Separator for Aqueous Zinc-Ion Batteries

作者：Penghui Cao, Haochen Zhou, Xiangyang Zhou, Qing Du, Jingjing Tang, Juan Yang · 发表于：ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering · 年份：2022 · DOI：10.1021/acssuschemeng.2c01133 · 被引用次数：67 · 研究领域：Advanced battery technologies research、Perovskite Materials and Applications、Advanced Battery Materials and Technologies

The poor electrochemical stabilities of aqueous zinc-ion batteries (AZIBs) are mainly related to the uncontrollable dendrite growth, hydrogen evolution, and side reactions. Here, a commercial cotton towel (CT) is directly developed as a separator of AZIBs to mitigate these problems. This CT separator effectively buffers the hydrogen evolution and side reactions to enhance the reversibility of a Zn anode. Additionally, the strong coordination between the hydroxyl group in the CT separator and Zn 2+ significantly constrains two-dimensional surface diffusion of Zn atom and increases nucleation sites, further regulating uniform Zn deposition, which effectively cushions Zn dendrite formation. Accordingly, the symmetric cell equipped with the CT separator displays an ultralong lifespan of over 1200 h at 1 mA cm –2 for 0.5 mAh cm –2 and 700 h at 2 mA cm –2 for 4 mAh cm –2 . Notably, the CT separator significantly boosts the cyclability of a MnO 2 full cell at 1 A g –1 (96.9 mAh g –1 after 2400 cycles). A flexible soft-packaged cell consisting of CT enables an impressive electrochemical performance. Such a high-performance separator with attractive cost effectiveness provides a potential prospect for large-scale applications of AZIBs in electrochemical energy storage devices and wearable electronics.