Porous and Low-Crystalline Manganese Silicate Hollow Spheres Wired by Graphene Oxide for High-Performance Lithium and Sodium Storage.

Abstract

Herein, a graphene oxide (GO)-wired manganese silicate (MS) hollow sphere (MS/GO) composite is successfully synthesized. Such an architecture possesses multiple advantages in lithium and sodium storage. The hollow MS structure provides a sufficient free space for volume variation accommodation; the porous and low-crystalline features facilitate the diffusion of lithium ions; meanwhile, the flexible GO sheets enhance the electronic conductivity of the composite to a certain degree. When applied as the anode material for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs), the as-obtained MS/GO composite exhibits a high reversible capacity, ultrastable cyclability, and good rate performance. Particularly, the MS/GO composite delivers a high capacity of 699 mA h g-1 even after 1000 cycles at 1 A g-1. The sodium-storage performance of MS/GO has been studied for the first time, and it delivers a stable capacity of 268 mA h g-1 after 300 cycles at 0.2 A g-1. This study suggests that the rational design of metal silicates would render them promising anode materials for LIBs and SIBs.