Academic Seminar (Course)
FENS G032
29.05.2024 - All Day
SEMINAR:Applications of carbonized electrospun nanomaterials...
Lithium-ion battery (LiB) electrodes are typically manufactured via slurry casting, which involves mixing active material particles, conductive carbon, and a polymeric binder in a solvent, followed by casting and drying the coating on current collectors (Al or Cu). These electrodes are functional but still limited in terms of pore network percolation, electronic connectivity, and mechanical stability, leading to poor electron/ion conductivities and mechanical integrity upon cycling, which result in battery degradation. To address this, we fabricate trichome-like carboniron fabrics via a combination of electrospinning and pyrolysis. Compared with slurry cast Fe2O3 and graphite-based electrodes, the carboniron fabric (CMF) electrode provides enhanced high-rate capacity (10C and above) and stability, for both half-cell and full cell testing (the latter with a standard lithium nickel manganese oxide (LNMO) cathode). Further, the CMFs are free-standing and lightweight.
In a similar work, several positive electrodes were employed in the hydrogen/manganese (H/Mn) hybrid redox flow battery (regenerative fuel cell). This was a follow-on work from a similar investigation on a hydrogen/vanadium RFB. Graphite felt showed a better performance and thus this was used in combination with carbon metal fabrics (prepared by means of electrospinning) to improve the performance even further. High energy efficiencies more than 84 were noted at 100 mA cm2 along with relatively high peak power densities around 0.6 W cm2 (for gas-liquid based hybrid RFBs only). In addition, 100 charge/discharge cycles were successfully performed at the same current density with electrolyte capacities above 20 W h L1.