Self-Assembled Synthesis of Hierarchical Waferlike Porous Li–V–O Composites as Cathode Materials for Lithium Ion Batteries

Wafer-like porous xLiV3O8-yLi0.3V2O5 (Li–V–O) composites are synthesized by a facile self-assembled synthesis using a glycine-assisted solution route followed by a low-temperature reaction. The crystalline compounds have a uniform shape and distribution of sizes, and the primary particles are platelike in shape with 150–500 nm in length and 80–200 nm in width. Such porous materials have many advantages such as good electrical contact among the particles and easy for electrolyte to penetrate the active materials, thus facilitating improvement in the electrochemical performance of Li-intercalation cathode. Among these Li–V–O composites, the one synthesized at 400 °C, which has 27.06 wt % Li0.3V2O5, exhibits the highest initial discharge capacities of 300.5, 265.7, and 237.0 mAh g–1 at current densities of 20 (C/15), 50 (C/6), and 120 mA g–1 (0.4 C) between 2.0 and 4.0 V, respectively. The good electrochemical performance of the as-synthesized composite can be attributed to the porous structure, thus highly favors the solid-state diffusion kinetics and enhances the capacity of the Li–V–O electrode. The ease of synthetic preparation of this novel porous Li–V–O composite together with its good electrochemical performance shows promise application in lithium ion batteries.