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Effect of surface oxidation on the performance of silicon nanoparticles

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Abstract

Reducing silicon particle size in lithium-ion battery anodes not only mitigates surface stress, prevents pulverization, and reduces SEI film cracking but also significantly enhances surface area, thereby amplifying the impact of particle surface chemistry on performance. In this study, the surface of silicon particles with 80-nm diameter were oxidized in air to prepare Si@SiOx with a core–shell structure. We investigated the effect of different oxidation levels of the shell on the cycling performance of the nanosized silicon particles. The results showed that longer heating times decreased initial coulombic efficiency (ICE) but improved cycling performance. An interesting phenomenon was observed that, when the oxidation level was high, fast charging reduced battery capacity; while at lower oxidation levels, fast charging maintained or even slightly increased battery capacity. Based on electrochemical analysis, we proposed an explanation for this phenomenon: for small-sized nanoparticles with a large specific surface area, the effect of potential is particularly significant. The oxidation level of the particle surface affects the impedance of the SEI film, and high charge/discharge rates will also produce bias voltage, both of the two factors will limit the formation of crystallized Li15Si4 (c-Li15Si4). Reducing the amount of c-Li15Si4 can effectively improve the cycling performance of the electrode, but excessive bias voltage will sacrifice the lithium storage capacity of the electrode. For the designing of small size silicon particles, both factors should be considered.

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Data would be available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Funding

We gratefully acknowledge the financial support from the Natural Science Foundation of Zhejiang Province (LZ22E060001), Natural Science Foundation of Zhejiang Province (No. ZCLQ24E0101), and Zhejiang Science and Technology Plan Project (No. 2022C01199). We also thank the Instrumental Analysis Center of Shanghai Jiao Tong University for material characterization.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Mechanical Engineering, Hangzhou Dianzi University, Hangzhou, China

    Liang Gao, Wenxin Li, Jiahao Jiang, Mengjie Wang, Changyu Yao, Li Li & Hanyang Gao

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Contributions

LG contributed to experiment operation, data analysis and interpretation, and manuscript preparation. WL and HG contributed to the conceptualization and design of the study. JJ and MW contributed to data collection. CY and LL contributed equally to data verification and language modification of the manuscript. All authors have read and approved the final version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Wenxin Li.

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Gao, L., Li, W., Jiang, J. et al. Effect of surface oxidation on the performance of silicon nanoparticles. Ionics (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11581-024-05608-z

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