A semiconductor-electrochemistry model for design of high-rate Li ion battery

Abstract

Abstract For designing batteries with high-rate and long-life, electronic/ionic transport and reaction must be unified for metal oxide electrodes. However, it remains challenging for effectively integrating the whole substrate/active materials/electrolyte interfaces. Herein by taking Li ion battery as example, we propose a semiconductor-electrochemistry model by which a general but novel insight has been gained into interfacial effect in batteries. Different from those traditional viewpoints, this derived model lies across from physics to electrochemistry. A reaction driving force can be expressed in terms of Fermi energy change, based on the tradeoff between electronic and ionic concentration at the reaction interfacial region. Therefore, at thermodynamic-controlled interface I of substrate/electrode, increasing contact areas can afford higher activity for active materials. Whereas at kinetically-governed interface II of electrode/electrolyte or inside active materials, it is crucial to guarantee high-reaction Li ionic concentration, with which some sufficient reaction degrees can reach.