High sulfur loading application with the assistance of an extremely light-weight multifunctional layer on the separator for lithium-sulfur batteries

Abstract

For high-energy density lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries, the effective active material loading, cyclic stability, and modification hardly any effect on energy density are crucial factors, but these three indicators seem contradictory in most case. In this paper, cells with a high sulfur loading, 4.3 mg cm−2, demonstrate excellent performances with the assistance of reduced graphene oxide (rGO) modified on the separator, and the density of modified layer is only 0.1 mg cm−2, which is hardly any effect on energy density. Moreover, in order to understand the improvement mechanism of the modified layer, graphene oxide (GO) modified layer is also to be applied for comparison, which is also helpful to establish cognition to select other modification layers. Most important of all, the application of high sulfur loading is generally required for practical Li-S batteries and the extremely light-weight modified layer is beneficial to the exertion of the whole energy density.