Operando visualisation of battery chemistry in a sodium-ion battery by 23Na magnetic resonance imaging

Kendrick, Emma; Bray, Joshua M.; Doswell, Claire L.; Pavlovskaya, Galina E.; Chen, Lin; Kishore, Brij; Au, Heather; Alptekin, Hande; Titirici, Maria Magdalena; Meersmann, Thomas; Britton, Melanie M.

Abstract

© 2020, The Author(s). Sodium-ion batteries are a promising battery technology for their cost and sustainability. This has led to increasing interest in the development of new sodium-ion batteries and new analytical methods to non-invasively, directly visualise battery chemistry. Here we report operando 1H and 23Na nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and imaging experiments to observe the speciation and distribution of sodium in the electrode and electrolyte during sodiation and desodiation of hard carbon in a sodium metal cell and a sodium-ion full-cell configuration. The evolution of the hard carbon sodiation and subsequent formation and evolution of sodium dendrites, upon over-sodiation of the hard carbon, are observed and mapped by 23Na nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and imaging, and their three-dimensional microstructure visualised by 1H magnetic resonance imaging. We also observe, for the first time, the formation of metallic sodium species on hard carbon upon first charge (formation) in a full-cell configuration.

Citation

Kendrick, E., Bray, J. M., Doswell, C. L., Pavlovskaya, G. E., Chen, L., Kishore, B., Au, H., Alptekin, H., Titirici, M. M., Meersmann, T., & Britton, M. M. (2020). Operando visualisation of battery chemistry in a sodium-ion battery by 23Na magnetic resonance imaging. Nature Communications, 11(1), Article 2083. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-15938-x

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Apr 6, 2020
• Online Publication Date: Apr 29, 2020
• Publication Date: Dec 1, 2020
• Deposit Date: May 2, 2020
• Publicly Available Date: May 4, 2020
• Journal: Nature Communications
• Electronic ISSN: 2041-1723
• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 11
• Issue: 1
• Article Number: 2083
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-15938-x
• Keywords: General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology; General Physics and Astronomy; General Chemistry
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/4373193
• Publisher URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-15938-x
• Additional Information: Received: 12 December 2018; Accepted: 6 April 2020; First Online: 29 April 2020; : The authors declare no competing interests.