Organic materials look to finally fulfil their potential as electrodes after scientists in France and China create a new type of lithium storage material that uses polymeric complexes.
Structure of the material showing the lithium storage sites (pink balls).
Although previous attempts at making lithium storage materials (important for lithium ion batteries) from polypyrrole complexes have failed due to their negligible storage capacity, Qingyu Kong and Zhaoxiang Wang et al. have modified traditional polymerisation and reduction processes to make a polypyrrole–iron–oxygen complex that has overcome previous problems.
The multilayered material possesses strong intralayer Fe–N coordination, which endows it with high specific capacity. In addition, the high reversibility of the Fe–O–Fe interactions during cycling means the material has high stability. Finally, the conducting polypyrrole matrix gives the material an excellent rate performance.
Read about this exciting new find here.
Polypyrrole-iron-oxygen coordination complex as high performance lithium storage material
Qingyu Kong and Zhaoxiang Wang et al.
Energy Environ. Sci., 2011 DOI: 10.1039/C1EE01275D
