Approaching the Theoretical Capacities of LiMnBO3

In the last decades, there have been a lot of studies on the LiFePO₄ as a cathode material for lithium ion batteries. Its major target application was hybrid electric vehicles ( HEV ) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicle ( PHEV ). However, several hurdles remain before LiFePO₄ can be deployed on a commercial scale because the material is still not capable enough to the energy density demand required for the electrical vehicles. The polyanion materials based on metal borate can be one of the solutions to replace ( PO₄^3- ) anions due to high theoretical capacity, however, it has been reported that metal borate cathode materials could not make full use of its high theoretical capacities. We have successfully developed solid state synthesis method to produce lithium manganese borate ( LiMnBO₃ ). Our experiments have shown that well synthesized LiMnBO₃ delivers 190 mAh g^-1 in the voltage range between 1.5 ~ 4.5 V using constant current-constant voltage ( CC-CV )mode at 1/20 C, which means that the theoretical capacity of LiMnBO₃ can nearly be achieved under reasonable current density at room temperature by the simple synthesize method. This synthesis method allows the electrode of LiMnBO₃ to deliver high capacity, even when charge/discharge experiments at the high C rate. More details will be discussed at the meeting.