Beyond Local Solvation Structure: Nanometric Aggregates in Battery Electrolytes and their Effect on Electrolyte Properties

Yu, Zhou; Balsara, Nitash P.; Borodin, Oleg; Gewirth, Andrew A.; Hahn, Nathan T.; Maginn, Edward; Persson, Kristin; Srinivasan, Venkat; Toney, Michael F.; Xu, Kang; Zavadil, Kevin R.; Curtiss, Larry A.; Cheng, Lei

doi:10.1021/acsenergylett.1c02391

Beyond Local Solvation Structure: Nanometric Aggregates in Battery Electrolytes and their Effect on Electrolyte Properties

Journal Article · 13 January 2022 · ACS Energy Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1021/acsenergylett.1c02391· OSTI ID:1868926

Yu, Zhou; Balsara, Nitash P.; Borodin, Oleg; Gewirth, Andrew A.; Hahn, Nathan T.; Maginn, Edward; Persson, Kristin; Srinivasan, Venkat; Toney, Michael F.; Xu, Kang; Zavadil, Kevin R.; Curtiss, Larry A.; Cheng, Lei

Electrolytes are an essential component of all electrochemical storage and conversion devices, such as batteries. In the history of battery development, the complex nature of electrolytes has often been a bottleneck. Fundamental knowledge of electrolyte systems encompasses elucidation of structure-property relationships of the solution species. Recently, nanometric aggregates have been observed in several classes of electrolytes, including super-concentrated, redox-flow, multivalent, polymer, and ionic liquid-based electrolytes. Compared with the well-studied local solvation structures such as contact ion pairs and solvent-separated ions, these aggregates impose unique effects on the ion distribution and transport both within bulk electrolytes and at electrode/electrolyte interfaces. This Perspective highlights the discovery of the aggregates in various battery electrolytes and their impact on electrolyte properties. We also present an outlook for future studies of this emerging field of nanometric aggregates and the need for the development of new experimental and computational tools to study their properties.

Research Organization:: Argonne National Laboratory (ANL)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Science - Office of Basic Energy Sciences - Joint Center for Energy Storage Research (JCESR)

DOE Contract Number:: AC02-06CH11357

OSTI ID:: 1868926

Journal Information:: ACS Energy Letters, Journal Name: ACS Energy Letters Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 7

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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