Forcespinning of Microfibers and their Applications in Lithium-Ion and Sodium-Ion Batteries

In this paper, a scalable technique, Forcespinning (FS) is employed to produce SnO2/carbon composite microfibers as anode materials for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) and sodium-ion batteries (SBIs). The fiber preparation process involved the FS of Tin (II) 2-ethylhexanoate/PAN and PAN solution precursors into fibers and subsequently stabilizing in air at 280oC and calcined at 800oC under an inert atmosphere. A hollow and pore microstructure of the SnO2/CFs were produced that were flexible and were directly used as free-standing anodes in LIBs and SBIs An improved electrochemical performance was observed in the SnO2/C composite electrode in particular for the sodium ion battery (SIB), with a recorded specific capacity of 198 mAhg-1 after 50 cycles at a current density of 100 mAg-1. The FS method clearly produced both carbon and SnO2/C composite fiber electrodes that showed improved electrochemical performance for the SIB due largely to the unique structure and properties of the microfibers.