An Anthraquinone/Carbon Fiber Composite as Cathode Material for Rechargeable Sodium‐Ion Batteries

Abstract

The transition from rare to natural abundant materials in rechargeable batteries is becoming a grand challenge in developing a resource sustainable power supply. Since decades, scientists attempt to circumvent the lithium's resource problem by innovating alternative active metal ions. A cost‐effective alternative to lithium is to use sodium (Na) as the carrier ion in rechargeable batteries. We present an electrode composite material comprising anthraquinone (AQ) and nanostructured carbon fibers, as a cathode material for Na‐ion batteries. These electrodes are characterized by a large surface area, ordered porous network, large pore volume and good electrical conductivity. The material is further compared to the water soluble, mono‐substituted anthraquinone derivative, sulfonated 9,10‐anthraquinone (SAQ). While the SAQ/carbon fiber composite demonstrates a moderate initial discharge capacity of ∼95 mAh g−1 accompanied by substantial, initial capacity fading, the AQ/carbon fiber composite shows a remarkably high discharge capacity of ∼307 mAh g−1 and exhibit reasonable cycling stability over 115 charge/discharge cycles in a Na containing electrolyte. This may be best explained by the well‐structured intermolecular π‐π stacking of the thermally evaporated AQ layers and with the subjacent carbon fibers. Since AQ and SAQ are widely‐used industrial pigments, they may offer a cost‐effective, abundant and environmentally benign cathode material for secondary Na‐ion and Na‐flow batteries.

Next‐Generation Additive Manufacturing: Tailorable Graphene/Polylactic(acid) Filaments Allow the Fabrication of 3D Printable Porous Anodes for Utilisation within Lithium‐Ion Batteries

“…With the environmental pressure to reduce fossil fuel usage and the ever‐increasing demand upon energy consumption, there is currently a societal focus upon the fabrication of innovative energy production/storage devices ,,. Consequently, there has been a surge within the literature for research into the utilisation and understanding of novel nanomaterials such as graphene, carbon nanotubes and nanoalloys, which are providing a solid platform for the continued improvement within the efficiency and effectiveness of these novel energy storage devices, particularly within Li‐based batteries ,,,…”

Perylenetetracarboxylic Diimide as Diffusion‐Less Electrode Material for High‐Rate Organic Na‐Ion Batteries

“…The observed cycle‐life performances are relatively good compared to low‐molecular‐weight organic active materials previously reported for lithium or sodium systems, which typically suffer from poor cycle performance due to the dissolution of the redox‐active molecules into the electrolyte solutions [14, 32] . While there are numerous publications on organic cathode materials for Li‐ and Na‐ion batteries, there is still a manageable amount of literature on perylene‐based cathode materials for Na‐ion batteries.…”

“…The observed cycle-life performances are relatively good compared to low-molecular-weight organic active materials previously reported for lithium or sodium systems, which typically suffer from poor cycle performance due to the dissolution of the redox-activem olecules into the electrolyte solutions. [14,32] While there are numerousp ublicationso no rganic cathode materials for Li-and Na-ion batteries, there is still a manageable amount of literature on perylene-based cathode materials for Na-ion batteries. To put the results obtained for our PTCDI-Cp composite electrodes in perspective, Figure7 showsacomparison of the charging time over the specific capacity reached for various perylene-based cathode materials that have been reported for their application in Na-ion batteries.…”

“…[11] These excellent qualities are mainly due to their 1,4-benzoquinone units.D ifferent typeso fq uinones have been considered for nonaqueous and aqueous organic Na-ion batteries. [12][13][14] These compounds store charge via an ion-coordination mechanism wheret he Na ions associate to the negatively charged oxygen atomsu pon electrochemical reductiono ft he carbonyl groups, and dissociater eversibly during the reverse oxidation. Perylene diimidesa nd its derivatives have been previouslyi nvestigated as cathode material for organic SIBs.…”

Immobilized Poly(anthraquinones) for Electrochemical Energy Storage Applications: Structure‐Property Relations

“…Besides the ecological or toxicological reasons, for some applications like portable devices also the weight is crucial [4–8] . On the way towards organic based materials, anthraquinones (AQ) are one of the most studied group [9,10] for usage in energy storage applications like as organic electrode material for metal‐ion batteries, [6,11–13] redox‐flow batteries, [14,15] supercapacitors, [16,17] pseudocapacitive ion separation, [18] electrochemical carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) capture, [19–21] the electrocatalytic oxygen (O 2 ) reduction reaction (ORR) [22–24] or even medical applications [25] . Except for redox‐flow batteries heterogeneous redox‐active materials are required.…”