Abstract
The low capacities of commercial Li ion batteries and cycle instabilities of amorphous metal sulfide based batteries impose constraints on their utilization for large-scale energy storage. We report here the acid-free, room-temperature (RT), and solution-based synthesis of a chalcogenide–carbonaceous hybrid aerogel, termed as “chalcocarbogel”, comprising molybdenum sulfide (MoSx) and graphene oxide (GO). The chalcocarbogel is a nanoparticle-aggregated, porous, amorphous gel consisting of Mo3S13 and Mo2S12-like structures as determined by synchrotron X-ray PDF, XANES, and EXAFS. The MoSx-GO chalcocarbogel demonstrates high specific capacities of ∼1215 and ∼807 mAh g–1 for Li/MoSx-GO and Na/MoSx-GO cells, respectively, for a 50 mAg–1 discharge rate during the first cycle. After the activation cycles, the MoSx-GO chalcocarbogel stabilizes, maintaining high specific capacities of approximately ∼700 mAh g–1 for Li/MoSx-GO and ∼473 mAh g–1 for Na/MoSx-GO cells, while continuously cycling. The MoSx-GO aerogel reported here serves as a promising platform to develop chalcocarbogels for applications spanning both Li and Na ion batteries.
