Germanium as a donor dopant in garnet electrolytes

Abstract

Cubic Li7La3Zr2O12 (LLZO) garnet electrolytes continue to be viewed as an enabler of all-solid-state lithium battery technologies, or as protective membranes for next-generation lithium battery systems. Supervalent dopants at the lithium sublattice are commonly used to stabilise the conductive cubic phase, through the creation of lithium vacancies. The use of germanium (Ge4+) as a higher valent dopant substituting for Li+ was studied here and shown to stabilise the cubic LLZO phase through substitution of x = 0.10 mol of Ge (at the tetrahedral 24d Li sites of the space group Ia-3d, based on the neutron powder diffraction result). This substitution preference follows that of Al3+ (having a similar ionic radius and reported to reside at 24d sites), but with a lower critical concentration for cubic phase stabilisation, in agreement with charge neutrality arguments to obtain the required Li content (ca. 6.4–6.6 per formula unit) for optimum conductivity. The x = 0.10 composition gave the highest bulk Li ion conductivity of 2.8 × 10−4 S cm−1 at 25 °C, on the order of reported values for Al-doped LLZO. Surface chemical analysis using time of flight secondary ion mass spectrometry showed Ge homogeneously distributed within the grains as well as some Li-, O- and Ge- enrichment along the grain boundaries. Cyclic voltammetry of the cells containing Ge-doped LLZO showed a redox stability up to +5 V.