Preparation of Cu2O-Cu anode for high performance Li-ion battery via an electrochemical corrosion method

Cu2O was directly grown on Cu foam via a facile electrochemical corrosion method by the aid of H2O2. Galvanostatic battery testing shows that the Cu2O-Cu electrode exhibits excellent cycle stability and rate capability. It delivers charge and discharge capacity about 0.76 mA h cm(-2) without attenuation over 100 cycles under a charge/discharge rate of 0.15 C. After testing at various rates from 0.2 to 35 C over 60 cycles, the 5th-cycle discharge capacity can resume 98.9% when lowering the charge/discharge rate to 0.2 C. The performances are due to both the fine electric contact between Cu2O and Cu foam and a possible porous architecture of Cu2O electrode. The electrochemical reaction kinetic of Cu2O-Cu electrode was studied by cyclic voltammetry measurement at various scan rate, which indicates the anodic and cathodic peak currents show linear dependence on the square root of scan rate from 0.1 to 3 mV s(-1), suggesting a lithium ion diffusion controlled mechanism in the charge/discharge process. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.