Tailoring Na Solvation Environment and Electrode-Electrolyte Interphases with Sn(OTf) Additive in Non-flammable Phosphate Electrolytes towards Safe and Efficient Na-S Batteries.

Room-temperature sodium-sulfur (RT Na-S) batteries are promising for low-cost and large-scale energy storage applications. However, these batteries are plagued by safety concerns due to the highly flammable nature of conventional electrolytes. Although non-flammable electrolytes eliminate the risk of fire, they often result in compromised battery performance due to poor compatibility with sodium metal anode and sulfur cathode.

Boosting the "Solid-Liquid-Solid" Conversion Reaction via Bifunctional Carbonate-Based Electrolyte for Ultra-long-life Potassium-Sulfur Batteries.

Potassium-sulfur (K-S) batteries have attracted wide attention owing to their high theoretical energy density and low cost. However, the intractable shuttle effect of K polysulfides results in poor cyclability of K-S batteries, which severely limits their practical application. Herein, a bifunctional concentrated electrolyte (3 mol L potassium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl)imide in ethylene carbonate (EC)) with high ionic conductivity and low viscosity is developed to regulate the dissolution behavior of polysulfides and induce uniform K deposition.

Neuro-safety science: an emerging discipline to reveal the neural mechanisms of safety problems.

At present, the research of safety science discipline is limited to the level of describing psychology and behaviors, because the cognitive neural mechanisms behind them are unknown. This paper introduces an emerging interdiscipline, namely neuro-safety science, which uses the neuroscientific methods to investigate the neural systems behind safely relevant behaviors. Qualitative methods such as literature review method and theoretical model construction method were adopted for this study.

Optimizing the Fermi Level of a 3D Current Collector with Ni S /Ni P Heterostructure for Dendrite-Free Sodium-Metal Batteries.

Rechargeable sodium-metal batteries (RSMBs) with high energy density and low cost are attracting extensive attention as promising energy-storage technologies. However, the poor cyclability and safety issues caused by unstable solid electrolyte interphase (SEI) structure and dendrite issues limit their practical application. Herein, it is theoretically predicted that constructing the Ni S /Ni P heterostructure with high work function can lower the Fermi energy level, and therefore effectively suppressing continuous electrolyte decomposition derived from the electron-tunneling effect after long-term sodiation process.

Revisiting the Role of Physical Confinement and Chemical Regulation of 3D Hosts for Dendrite-Free Li Metal Anode.

Lithium metal anode has been demonstrated as the most promising anode for lithium batteries because of its high theoretical capacity, but infinite volume change and dendritic growth during Li electrodeposition have prevented its practical applications. Both physical morphology confinement and chemical adsorption/diffusion regulation are two crucial approaches to designing lithiophilic materials to alleviate dendrite of Li metal anode. However, their roles in suppressing dendrite growth for long-life Li anode are not fully understood yet.

RuO Particles Anchored on Brush-Like 3D Carbon Cloth Guide Homogenous Li/Na Nucleation Framework for Stable Li/Na Anode.

Lithium (sodium)-metal batteries are the most promising batteries for next-generation electrical energy storage due to their high volumetric energy density and gravimetric energy density. However, their applications have been prevented by uncontrollable dendrite growth and large volume expansion during the stripping/plating process. To address this issue, the key strategy is to realize uniform lithium (sodium) deposition during the stripping/plating process.

Three-Dimensional Ordered Macroporous Metal-Organic Framework Single Crystal-Derived Nitrogen-Doped Hierarchical Porous Carbon for High-Performance Potassium-Ion Batteries.

The biggest challenge of potassium-ion batteries (KIBs) application is to develop high-performance electrode materials to accommodate the potassium ions large size. Herein, by rational design, we carbonize three-dimensional (3D) ordered macroporous ZIF-8 to fabricate 3D interconnected nitrogen-doped hierarchical porous carbon (N-HPC) that shows excellent rate performance (94 mAh g at 10.0 A g), unprecedented cycle stability (157 mA g after 12000 cycles at 2.

Regulating Lithium Nucleation via CNTs Modifying Carbon Cloth Film for Stable Li Metal Anode.

Li metal is demonstrated as one of the most promising anode materials for high energy density batteries. However, uncontrollable Li dendrite growth and repeated growth of solid electrolyte interface during the charge/discharge process lead to safety issues and capacity decay, preventing its practical application. To address these issues, an effective strategy is to realize uniform Li nucleation.

CNT Interwoven Nitrogen and Oxygen Dual-Doped Porous Carbon Nanosheets as Free-Standing Electrodes for High-Performance Na-Se and K-Se Flexible Batteries.

Na-Se and K-Se batteries are attractive as a stationary energy storage system because of much abundant resources of Na and K in the Earth's crust. As the alloy-type Se has a severe pulverization issue, one critical challenge to develop advanced Na-Se and K-Se batteries is to explore a highly efficient and stable Se-based cathode. Herein, a flexible free-standing Se/carbon composite film is prepared by encapsulation of Se into a carbon nanotube (CNT) interwoven N,O dual-doped porous carbon nanosheet (Se@NOPC-CNT).