On the effect of the carbonaceous substrate in the nucleation of Sn nanoparticles for Li-ion anodes: experiments and first principles calculations

S Smrekar and MEZ Michoff and JE Thomas and CA Calderon and LM Farigliano and A Visintin and EPM Leiva and DE Barraco, JOURNAL OF SOLID STATE ELECTROCHEMISTRY, 22, 1721-1733 (2018).

DOI: 10.1007/s10008-017-3859-x

The nucleation of Sn nanoparticles by chemical reduction was studied using three different carbonaceous substrates, to obtain Sn/C composites. When used as active materials in anodes for lithium-ion batteries, these composites displayed higher capacities than commercially used graphite, and showed a good cyclability. The differences in morphology, capacity, cyclability, and diffusion between the resulting materials are highlighted. The resulting materials were characterized by charge-discharge cycling, voltammetry, EIS, SEM, and TEM microscopy. It was found that the substrate has a determinant effect on the deposition of Sn. This effect is interpreted in terms of the relative adsorption energies of a single Sn atom obtained from DFT calculations.

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