Shukla, AK, Ramasse, QM orcid.org/0000-0001-7466-2283, Ophus, C et al. (3 more authors) (2015) Unravelling structural ambiguities in lithium- and manganese-rich transition metal oxides. Nature Communications, 6. 8711. ISSN 2041-1723
Abstract
Although Li- and Mn-rich transition metal oxides have been extensively studied as high-capacity cathode materials for Li-ion batteries, the crystal structure of these materials in their pristine state is not yet fully understood. Here we apply complementary electron microscopy and spectroscopy techniques at multi-length scale on well-formed Li1.2(Ni0.13Mn0.54Co0.13)O2 crystals with two different morphologies as well as two commercially available materials with similar compositions, and unambiguously describe the structural make-up of these samples. Systematically observing the entire primary particles along multiple zone axes reveals that they are consistently made up of a single phase, save for rare localized defects and a thin surface layer on certain crystallographic facets. More specifically, we show the bulk of the oxides can be described as an aperiodic crystal consisting of randomly stacked domains that correspond to three variants of monoclinic structure, while the surface is composed of a Co- and/or Ni-rich spinel with antisite defects.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | ©2015 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
Keywords: | Applied physics; Materials for energy and catalysis; Structure of solids and liquids |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences (Leeds) > School of Chemical & Process Engineering (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 08 Jan 2021 10:55 |
Last Modified: | 08 Jan 2021 10:55 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Nature Research |
Identification Number: | 10.1038/ncomms9711 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:165998 |