Role of Mixed Inorganic Additives in Controlling the Dendrite Growth in Lithium Metal Anodes

Here we demonstrate to suppress the dendrite growth and stabilize the LMA using Lithium difluoro(oxalato)borate (LiDFOB) and tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) as primary and secondary additives in commercial LiPF 6 salt electrolyte. While the incorporation of LiDFOB additive potentially reduced the overpotential values, thereby improving the cycling stability in comparison to commercial electrolyte in Li/Li symmetric cell, the performance characteristics dramatically enhanced on using TEOS as the secondary electrolyte additive. In addition, rate capabilities of the NMC/Li full cells are apparently higher on using the additives in the electrolyte system. The profound effect is attributed to the formation of film layer on the lithium surface, which eventually regulates the lithium deposition during the electrochemical cycling. Thus, incorporation of multiple inorganic additives in the commercial electrolyte system paves a way in making high performance lithium-metal batteries.