Synthesis of MoO2 and Nitrogen-Doped Carbon Nanotubes Composite Materials By Electrodeposition As Binder-Free Electrode for Lithium-Ion Batteries

Molybdenum dioxide (MoO₂) have attracted much attention as an electrode material for lithium ion batteries because of  high theoretical capacity. But bulk MoO₂ exhibits low specific capacity and poor cycle stability because of the inert kinetics and significant structure change during the insertion/deinsertion of lithium ions. To address these problems, different nano-morphologies  MoO₂ is prepared to improve the specific capacity and enhance the cycle performance. Despite the superior specific capacity is obtained, the cycle performance of pure MoO₂ is still not satisfactory. Another effective strategy to address these problems is to composite MoO₂with high electro-conducting carbon materials.

In this work, MoO₂ and N-CNTs nanocomposite have been successfully synthesized by a facile electrodepositon method followed by thermal annealing in argon atmosphere. As an anode material for lithium ion batteries, electrochemical behavior of the nanocomposite has been studied. The as-prepared nanocomposite with desirable structural features exhibits significantly improved electrochemical performance compared to pure MoO₂ or N-CNTs, resulting from that the conductive and elastic carbon nanotube can effectively mitigate the strain caused by structural and volume change and prevent the aggregation of active materials during cycling. This novel architecture of the nanocomposite has the advantage of the high inherently higher capacity of the MoO₂as well as the good cycle performance of the N-CNTs, feature which make the nanocomposite a promising anode material for lithium ion batteries.

Acknowledgements

The authors appreciate the financial support of LPMT, CAEP (ZZ13007), Project 2013A030214 supported by CAEP.