AFM: carbon tube slurry helps zinc metal battery interfacial water removal

In battery systems, zinc metal batteries (ZMBs) have attracted much attention due to their advantages such as high theoretical specific capacity, low electrochemical potential, and low toxicity. However, water- related side reactions have become a major problem hindering the practical application of Zn metal batteries.

On May 24, 2023, the journal Advanced Functional Materials reported that the team of Chen Libao from Central South University and Professor Yan Chenglin from the School of Energy, Soochow University jointly worked on water removal at the interface of zinc metal batteries.

In this work, in order to eliminate the influence of interfacial water, the researchers synthesized a covalent organic polymer (COP) layer with N, N'-bis(salicyl)ethylenediamine structure on the copper foil, and by DFT and MD calculations demonstrate the strong interaction between Zn ions and the Salen structure of COP, which contributes to the uniform deposition of Zn and the fast desolvation kinetics of solvated Zn2+, thereby mitigating the water-related side reactions and favoring Removal of interfacial water.

exhibits an average Coulombic efficiency of 99.5% at a high capacity of 5.0 mA h cm −2 when a battery is assembled based on a common ZnSO4-based COP/Cu@Zn anode. Moreover, the full cell composed of MnO2 and COP/Cu@Zn anode exhibits stable cycling performance even at a low N/P ratio of 1.2. The strategy presented here paves the way to enhance the reversibility of Zn anodes for practical applications in Zn metal batteries and can be used in other aqueous battery systems.

in the preparation of MnO 2 battery cathodes in this article comes from XFNANO.

Article title: Excluding the Trouble from Interfacial Water by Covalent Organic Polymer to Realize Extremely Reversible Zn Anode

Small: Multi-wall carbon tube grafted carbon fiber boosts performance

Due to its excellent performance, carbon fiber (CF) has become the focus of research in many fields such as manufacturing, automobile industry, aviation, aerospace, and sports equipment. However, due to poor adhesion between CF and matrix resin, stress concentration and microcracks are prone to occur at the interface, leading to material failure.

On May 24, 2023, the journal Small reported a new and simple method developed by the team of Professor Zhu Bo from Shandong University to chemically graft multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) onto the surface of carbon fibers (CFs) for improved composite Interlayer properties of materials.

The researchers first prepared a maleimide-modified waterborne polyurethane (MWPU) emulsion as a sizing agent for CF. Then, multi-walled carbon tubes (MWCNTs-FA) containing furan groups were obtained by chemical treatment. Finally, based on the Diels-Alder reaction under mild reaction conditions (60 °C), a CF/MWCNTs multiscale reinforced material (MSCF) was successfully prepared by a two-step method of MWPU sizing and MWCNTs ultrasonic grafting. The grafting effect of MWCNTs greatly reduces the contact angle between carbon fiber and water from 103.6° to 59.4°, that is, the wettability of fiber and resin is significantly improved.

In addition, the study also found that the interlaminar shear strength (ILSS) and flexural strength of MSCF/epoxy resin reinforced composites increased to 64.54 MPa and 981.95 MPa, which were significantly increased by 52.84% and 32.32%, respectively, greatly improving the strength of fiber and resin. interface performance. This process can match the current commercial carbon fiber production and is expected to be commercialized.

The main material used in this article is multi-walled carbon nanotubes from XFNANO (diameter >50 nm, length <10 μm), product number XFM31.

Article title: Two-step method to realize continuous multi-wall carbon nanotube grafted on the fibers to improve the interface of carbon fibers/epoxy resin composites based on the Diels-Alder reaction

Carboxylated multi-walled carbon nanotube aqueous slurry Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (click on the product name to view detailed parameters)