A novel Fe₃O₄/buckypaper composite as free-standing anode for lithium-ion battery

The octahedral Fe₃O₄ (magnetite) nanoparticles were electrochemically grown on self-supported buckypaper and characterized by XRD, SEM, Raman and TGA. It could be used as a kind of metallic current collector-free anode for lithium ion battery, which would significantly reduce the mass of the whole anode by 66%. The new flexible Fe₃O₄/buckypaper composite anode achieves a higher initial reversible capacity of 1120 mAh g⁻¹ and exhibits more stable performance compared with Fe₃O₄ anode coated on Cu foil by traditional electrode-fabrication technique. This is due to that the flexible 3D porous-structured Fe₃O₄/buckypaper composite is light weight and can accommodate the volume change of Fe₃O₄ during the lithiation/delithiation process, and promotes the diffusion and transfer of lithium ion and electron, respectively. Moreover, this buckypaper/Fe₃O₄ composite anode displays excellent rate capability, which maintains a discharge specific capacity of 210 mAh g⁻¹ when the applied current rate is 10 °C and still delivers 1150 mAh g⁻¹ after returning to 0.2 °C. Our work provides a new way to develop novel electrode structure for light-weighted and flexible lithium-ion battery. - Highlights: • We have successfully electrochemically deposited Fe₃O₄ particles on buckypaper. • The metallic current collector-free Fe₃O₄/buckypaper anode can significantly reduce the mass of the anode. • The flexible anode achieves a higher initial reversible capacity and more stable performance. • This work provides a new way to develop novel anodic structure for high capacity and less weight lithium-ion battery.