Electro-polymerized polypyrrole film for fabrication of flexible and slurry-free polypyrrole-sulfur-polypyrrole sandwich electrode for the lithium-sulfur battery

Authors

Mohammad R. Kaiser, University of Wollongong, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research OrganizationFollow
Zhaojun Han, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, University of New South Wales
Jiazhao Wang, University of WollongongFollow

RIS ID

137948

Publication Details

Kaiser, M. Rejaul., Han, Z. & Wang, J. (2019). Electro-polymerized polypyrrole film for fabrication of flexible and slurry-free polypyrrole-sulfur-polypyrrole sandwich electrode for the lithium-sulfur battery. Journal of Power Sources, 437 226925-1-226925-8.

Abstract

Thin films of polypyrrole (PPy) were electrochemically synthesized from direct oxidation of pyrrole (Py) which is a five-membered ring heterocyclic aromatic compound with a dipole moment of 1.58D. The electro-polymerized PPy thin film shows sufficiently good mechanical properties to be included in a self-supporting free-standing layered cathode. Physical and morphological characterizations show that this PPy film is flexible, robust, lightweight, corrugated, and highly conductive. These properties facilitate the use of PPy thin film in a self-supported flexible electrode composed of slurry-free PPy-sulfur-PPy sandwiched structure. Because the conventional slurry casting method could be avoided, a large amount of active material could be loaded in between the corrugated PPy films. The newly developed flexible PPy-sulfur-PPy sandwiched electrode thus show high capacity when coupled with lithium, along with good cycling performance and excellent capacity retention.