Nitrogen-Doped Carbon Coated WS2 Nanosheets as Anode for High-Performance Sodium-Ion Batteries

Yong Liu; Huijie Wei; Chao Wang; Fei Wang; Haichao Wang; Wanhong Zhang; Xianfu Wang; Chenglin Yan; Bok H Kim; Fengzhang Ren

doi:10.3389/fchem.2018.00236

Nitrogen-Doped Carbon Coated WS₂ Nanosheets as Anode for High-Performance Sodium-Ion Batteries

Front Chem. 2018 Aug 23:6:236. doi: 10.3389/fchem.2018.00236. eCollection 2018.

Authors

Yong Liu¹, Huijie Wei¹, Chao Wang^{1

2}, Fei Wang¹, Haichao Wang¹, Wanhong Zhang¹, Xianfu Wang², Chenglin Yan², Bok H Kim^{1

3}, Fengzhang Ren¹

Affiliations

¹ The Key Laboratory of Henan Province on Nonferrous Metallic Materials Science and Fabrication Technology, Collaborative Innovation Center of Nonferrous Metals of Henan Province, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Henan University of Science and Technology, Luoyang, China.
² Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory for Advanced Carbon Materials and Wearable Energy Technologies, Collaborative Innovation Center of Suzhou Nano Science and Technology, College of Physics, Optoelectronics and Energy, Soochow Institute for Energy and Materials Innovations, Soochow University, Suzhou, China.
³ Division of Advanced Materials Engineering, Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Research Center, Chonbuk National University, Jeonbuk, South Korea.

Abstract

Due to the cost-effectiveness of sodium source, sodium-ion batteries (SIBs) have attracted considerable attention. However, SIBs still have some challenges in competing with lithium-ion batteries for practical applications. Particularly, the high rate capability and cycling stability are posing big problems for SIBs. Here, nitrogen-doped carbon-coated WS₂ nanosheets (WS₂/NC) were successfully synthesized by a high-temperature solution method, followed by carbonization of polypyrrole. When used as anode electrodes for SIBs, WS₂/NC composite exhibited high-rate capacity at 386 and 238.1 mAh g^-1 at 50 and 2,000 mA g^-1, respectively. Furthermore, even after 400 cycle, the composite electrode could still deliver a capacity of ~180.1 mAh g^-1 at 1,000 mA g^-1, corresponding to a capacity loss of 0.09% per cycle. The excellent electrochemical performance could be attributed to the synergistic effect of the highly conductive nature of the nitrogen-doped carbon-coating and WS₂ nanosheets. Results showed that the WS₂/NC nanosheets are promising electrode materials for SIBs application.

Keywords: N-doped carbon; electrochemical performances; nanosheets; sodium ion batteries; tungsten disulfide.