Deployment of Lithium-sulfur (Li-S) battery has been hindered by the low practically achievable energy and limited cycle life, although significant advances have been demonstrated in material development and fundamental understandings.¹ There are still challenges in pursuing high energy Li-S battery lacking of high energy cathodes, stable anodes and electrolytes, particularly scientific knowledge bridging fundamental research and practical deployment. Sulfur cathodes host active materials for Li⁺ storage and thus determine the total capacity of the system. However, specific energy of the Li-S battery is highly dependent on the whole weight of the system, of which electrolyte takes a largest weight fraction but contributes nothing to energy. So rational electrode architecture design is of significant importance to not only realize the high sulfur mass loading but also decrease the electrolyte uptake to a very limited level.² This is very challenging but the only pathway to the target of high energy Li-S battery for practical applications. In an attempt to addressing the key challenges in achieving high energy Li-S battery, our efforts are focused on the understanding of fundamental reasons that affect sulfur utilization in high loading electrodes and with lean amount electrolytes. Based on our understanding, rational cathode design including electrode materials, binders and electrode architectures has been proposed and demonstrated for high loading electrode preparation. At the meeting, we will present our recent progresses on the fundamental understanding and practical demonstration of high energy Li-S batteries.

References

(1) Manthiram A., Fu Y., Chung S.-H., Zu C.,Su Y.-S., Chem. Rev. (Washington, DC, U. S.) 2014, 114, 11751-11787.

(2) Lv D., Zheng J., Li Q., Xie X., Ferrara S., Nie Z., Mehdi L. B., Browning N. D., Zhang J. G.,Graff G. L., Adv. Energy Mater. 2015, 5, 1402290.