Oxygen activity excited thiophene-diketopyrrolopyrrole-based organic molecules as anode for lithium-ion batteries with enhanced interfacial storage capacity and long cycling capability

Abstract

In this work, we synthesized various thiophene-diketopyrrolopyrrole-based (DPP-2T-based) molecules by Knoevenagel condensation and halogenation reaction, which applied DPP-2T-based small molecules as anode for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) for the first time. We studied the different substituents on battery performance and explored the charge–discharge mechanism for DPP-2T-based molecules. DPP-2T-based molecules exhibit different electrochemical properties by substituting various groups at nitrogen positions, where DPP-2T-TA (tert-butyl acetate) electrode possesses better capacity and long-term cycle performance than that of DPP-2T-H (no substitution) and DPP-2T-C6 (hexane) electrode. DPP-2T-TA electrode present an unusual upward tendency for its discharge specific capacity during cycling, which displays that of 530 mAh/g (1000 mA g−1) after 2000 cycles and the capacity retention reaches up to 142.5 %. It is better than those of DPP-2T-H (439 mAh/g, 108.1 %) and DPP-2T-C6 (423 mAh/g, 113.1 %) electrode, which is ascribed to oxygen activity excitation in tert-butyl acetate. This moment, the energy density and power density of DPP-2T-TA electrode are 346 Wh kg−1 and 699 W kg−1, respectively. To further explain this phenomenon, we used many ex-situ measurgin methods such as differential specific capacity (dQ/dV) curves, scanning electron microscope (SEM), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectrometer, X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and natural bond orbital (NBO) analysis to characterize the detailed lithiation/delithiation process of DPP-2T-TA electrode. The results suggest that the unusual capacity amplification for DPP-2T-TA electrode attributed to lithium-ions inserted into unsaturated carbons and increases its interfacial storage capacity. We believe that the synthesis of DPP-2T-based organic molecules can provide a novel strategy for the development of organic electrode materials for LIBs.