An integrated materials synthesis, and parallel test platform is designed and developed for Lithium-ion battery materials research. Materials powder with target composition was mixed by the developed system and sintered in the tube furnace to form the layered oxides. Then the synthesized material was used to fabricate the electrode on the platform. Meanwhile, the synthesized material was characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM). Fabricated electrodes were assembled in the chamber of the system with the multi-cell plates. Electrochemical tests, such as cyclic voltammery (CV), galvanostatic cell cycling test (GC) were executed by the multi-cell plate to validate the quality of the synthesized material.

In this work, a solid-state approach is used for the combinatorial synthesis. Novel adjustable grinder, flexible gear transmission system and multi-chamber configuration are used to thoroughly process the powder before and after the material sintering . The synthesized materials were mixed with carbon black and PTFE to fabricate electrode in the same chamber of the platform after powder sampling for property characterization, and then multi-cell plate was configured to assemble the fabricated electrode into battery. The capacity and coulombic efficiency of the battery were tested. Two compositional systems (Li-Ni oxide and Li-Ni-Al oxide) were explored and the effects of synthesis parameters, such as powder treating force and speed, sintering temperature, oxygen flow pressure, and Lithium content, aluminum doping content were studied by the combinatorial platform. The combinatorial materials synthesis, characterization and testing platform can significantly reduce time and cost of performing large sets of experiments with multiple processing parameters towards a more efficient strategy for electrode material exploration.