(134g) Nanofiber-Based Cathode Electrocatalysts Supported On Carbon Substrates for Lithium-Air Rechargeable Batteries

Nanofiber-Based Cathode Electrocatalysts Supported on Carbon Substrates for Lithium-Air Rechargeable Batteries

Jun Yin^a, Jangwoo Kim^a, and Yong Lak Joo^a*

^a School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853

In terms of usable energy density rivaling that of gasoline, rechargeable lithium-air batteries have attracted increasing interests presently.  However, the practical capacity was highly affected by the effective catalyst materials in the air cathode in Li-air batteries. The demand for effective catalyst materials in the air cathode requires the design and synthesis multifunction catalysts for power density improvement.  In this presentation, several types of metal oxide nanofibers (e.g., ZnO, Co₃O₄ etc) were synthesized by water-based electrospinning of highly loaded precursor solutions, followed by thermal treatment and their use as the cathode catalysts in single-cell measurements was described.  In the meantime, the correlation between the various carbon-based substrates and the metal oxide fiber catalysts and how they synergistically influence the electrocatalytic activity will also be discussed. The metal oxide nanofibers are characterized using an array of techniques such as SEM, XRD, XPS, BET and Raman to determine their morphology and structural properties. Charging – discharging evaluation, cyclic voltammetric measurements in organic electrolytes were carried out to assess the mechanistic details as well.