High-Performance Li-Ion Capacitor Based on an Activated Carbon Cathode and Well-Dispersed Ultrafine TiO2 Nanoparticles Embedded in Mesoporous Carbon Nanofibers Anode

• Published in: ACS applied materials & interfaces Vol. 9; no. 22; pp. 18710 - 18719
• Main Authors: Yang, Cheng, Lan, Jin-Le, Liu, Wen-Xiao, Liu, Yuan, Yu, Yun-Hua, Yang, Xiao-Ping
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: American Chemical Society 07.06.2017
• Subjects: mesoporous structure; electrospinning; TiO2 nanoparticles; carbon nanofibers; Li-ion capacitor
• ISSN: 1944-8244; 1944-8252
• DOI: 10.1021/acsami.7b02068

A novel Li-ion capacitor based on an activated carbon cathode and a well-dispersed ultrafine TiO2 nanoparticles embedded in mesoporous carbon nanofibers (TiO2@PCNFs) anode was reported. A series of TiO2@PCNFs anode materials were prepared via a scalable electrospinning method followed by carbonization and a postetching method. The size of TiO2 nanoparticles and the mesoporous structure of the TiO2@PCNFs were tuned by varying amounts of tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) to increase the energy density and power density of the LIC significantly. Such a subtle designed LIC displayed a high energy density of 67.4 Wh kg–1 at a power density of 75 W kg–1. Meanwhile, even when the power density was increased to 5 kW kg–1, the energy density can still maintain 27.5 Wh kg–1. Moreover, the LIC displayed a high capacitance retention of 80.5% after 10000 cycles at 10 A g–1. The outstanding electrochemical performance can be contributed to the synergistic effect of the well-dispersed ultrafine TiO2 nanoparticles, the abundant mesoporous structure, and the conductive carbon networks.