Stretchable Textile Rechargeable Zn Batteries Enabled by a Wax Dyeing Method

Abstract

AbstractThe development of smart electronic textiles faces one challenge that the power devices should be as comfortable, lightweight, and flexible as that of common fabrics. Herein, a stretchable textile‐based rechargeable Zn microbattery fabricated through a method analogous to Chinese traditional Batik wax dyeing is reported. Conductive metal coatings (Ni and Cu) in arbitrary patterns are prepared on a variety of fabrics, either hydrophobic or hydrophilic. The resistance of a knitted conductive textile is fully recoverable and extremely stable even after 1000 cycles of stretching to 50% tensile strain, due to the absence of damage in the conformal metal coatings. An in‐plane rechargeable alkaline Zn microbattery is then fabricated on the conductive textile using Zn as the anode and NiCo bimetallic oxyhydroxide as the cathode, achieving an areal capacity about 0.45 mAh cm−2. Stable stretchability of the textile Zn microbattery is also demonstrated. The stretchable textile conductors and rechargeable Zn microbatteries suggest great potentials in stretchable electronics or electronic textiles.