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High-energy long-cycling all-solid-state lithium metal batteries enabled by silver–carbon composite anodes

Nature Energy volume 5, pages 299–308 (2020)Cite this article

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Abstract

An all-solid-state battery with a lithium metal anode is a strong candidate for surpassing conventional lithium-ion battery capabilities. However, undesirable Li dendrite growth and low Coulombic efficiency impede their practical application. Here we report that a high-performance all-solid-state lithium metal battery with a sulfide electrolyte is enabled by a Ag–C composite anode with no excess Li. We show that the thin Ag–C layer can effectively regulate Li deposition, which leads to a genuinely long electrochemical cyclability. In our full-cell demonstrations, we employed a high-Ni layered oxide cathode with a high specific capacity (>210 mAh g−1) and high areal capacity (>6.8 mAh cm−2) and an argyrodite-type sulfide electrolyte. A warm isostatic pressing technique was also introduced to improve the contact between the electrode and the electrolyte. A prototype pouch cell (0.6 Ah) thus prepared exhibited a high energy density (>900 Wh l−1), stable Coulombic efficiency over 99.8% and long cycle life (1,000 times).

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Fig. 1: All-solid-state lithium metal battery.
Fig. 2: Morphology of direct Li plating on the current collector with the SSE.
Fig. 3: Stable Li plating and stripping through the Ag–C nanocomposite layer.
Fig. 4: Morphological variation of the Ag–C nanocomposite layer.
Fig. 5: Characterization of Ag and C particles in the Ag–C nanocomposite layer after cycling.
Fig. 6: Electrochemical performance of ASSB with SSEs.

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All the data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article and its Supplementary Information files. The data that support the plots within this paper are available from the corresponding authors upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by funds from Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology (SAIT), Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, Suwon, Korea

    Yong-Gun Lee, Changhoon Jung, Dong-Su Ko, Toshinori Sugimoto, Saebom Ryu, Jun Hwan Ku, Youngsin Park, Dongmin Im & In Taek Han

  2. Samsung R&D Institute Japan, Osaka, Japan

    Satoshi Fujiki, Naoki Suzuki, Nobuyoshi Yashiro, Ryo Omoda, Tomoyuki Shiratsuchi, Taku Watanabe & Yuichi Aihara

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Contributions

D.I., Y.A. and I.T.H. proposed and supervised the research. N.S., N.Y. and Y.A. proposed the metal–carbon composite concept. Y.-G.L., T. Sugimoto, S.R., N.S. and N.Y. optimized the Ag–C composite anode as well as the current collectors for the anode to achieve the best cycle performance. J.H.K., S.F. and T. Shiratsuchi optimized the effect of external pressure on the battery performance. R.O. developed and optimized the SSE. S.F. and T. Shiratsuchi designed and fabricated the high-Ni-based NMC cathode and prototype ASSB as well as the stacked cell (<5 Ah). S.F., R.O. and T. Shiratsuchi carried out the safety tests for LIB and ASSB. C.J. and Y.-G.L. conducted the SEM, Raman and XRD characterizations. D.-S.K. performed the TEM characterization to monitor the morphological changes in the Ag and C particles. S.R. and Y.-G.L. performed the X-ray CT analysis. Y.-G.L., T. Sugimoto, J.H.K., S.R., Y.P., S.F., N.S., N.Y., R.O., T. Shiratsuchi and T.W. performed the electrochemical characterizations. Y.-G.L., D.I., Y.A., S.F. and T.W. analysed the data and wrote the manuscript. All the authors discussed the results and commented on the manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Yong-Gun Lee, Yuichi Aihara or Dongmin Im.

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All the authors are employed at Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.

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Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary Figs. 1–19, Notes 1–4 and Tables 1–3.

Supplementary Video 1a

Heating test (LIB)

Supplementary Video 1b

Heating test (ASSB)

Supplementary Video 2

Oil bath test

Supplementary Video 3

Cutting test

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Lee, YG., Fujiki, S., Jung, C. et al. High-energy long-cycling all-solid-state lithium metal batteries enabled by silver–carbon composite anodes. Nat Energy 5, 299–308 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-020-0575-z

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