Hollow Co2SiO4 microcube with amorphous structure as anode material for construction of high performance lithium ion battery

To solve the problem of large volume expansion of cobalt silicate electrode during cyclic process and low electric conductivity, Co₂SiO₄ with amorphous, porous and hollow structure is firstly designed to act as high performance lithium ion battery (LIB) anode. Compared with crystalline materials, the amorphous Co₂SiO₄ microcube could facilitate Li⁺ diffusion to enhance their performance of LIBs because of isotropic characteristics. Here, the amorphous Co₂SiO₄ hollow microcube (named as a-Co₂SiO₄ HC) was prepared by mild hydrothermal method with use of MnCO₃ microcube as hard-template. Benefitting from the advantages of such structure, Li⁺ diffusion rate was greatly accelerated and the volume expansion can be alleviated. The as-prepared amorphous Co₂SiO₄ hollow microcube as anode material of LIBs exhibited significantly improved electrochemical performance of 610 mAh g⁻¹ even after 380 cycles at 500 mAh g⁻¹ than their crystalline counterpart (only 280 mAh g⁻¹ retained after 380 cycles). This work is a good try to employ amorphous metal silicate in LIBs and simultaneously motivate the exploration of other amorphous materials for high performance LIBs, SIBs, catalysts, etc.