The design of novel binder systems is required for the high capacity silicon (Si) anodes which usually undergo huge volume change during the charge/discharge cycling. Here, we introduce a poly (acrylic acid sodium)-grafted-carboxymethyl cellulose (NaPAA-g-CMC) copolymer as an excellent binder for Si anode in lithium ion batteries (LIBs). The NaPAA-g-CMC copolymer was prepared via a free radical...

Excitation of HeNe by synchrotron light just below the frequency of the 1s → 3p transition of isolated He has been recently shown to be followed by resonant interatomic Coulombic decay (ICD). The vibrationally resolved widths of the ICD states were extracted with high precision from the photoion spectra. In this paper, we report the results of ab initio calculations of these widths. We show tha...

The host-guest interaction between orthophosphate, pyrophosphate and triphosphate anions and four cyclen based bis-macrocycles ligands possessing ortho-(BOC), meta-(BMC), para-xylenyl (BPC) or 2,6-pyridinyl (BPyC) linker was investigated by potentiometric measurements and NMR spectroscopy. Each ligand gave protonated species in aqueous solution that further formed ternary complexes after bindin...

Tamarind seed, a household waste from the kitchen is used for the sorptive removal of fluoride from synthetic aqueous solution as well as from field water samples. Batch sorptive defluoridation was conducted under variable experimental conditions such as pH, agitation time, initial fluoride concentration, particle size and sorbent dose. Maximum defluoridation was achieved at pH 7.0. Defluoridat...

We present a theoretical study of the phase diagram of a frustrated Ising model with nearest-neighbor ferromagnetic interactions and long-range (Coulombic) antiferromagnetic interactions. For nonzero frustration, long-range ferromagnetic order is forbidden, and the ground state of the system consists of phases characterized by periodically modulated structures. At finite temperatures, the phase...

Successfully modeling electrostatic interactions is one of the key factors required for the computational design of proteins with desired physical, chemical, and biological properties. In this paper, we present formulations of the finite difference Poisson-Boltzmann (FDPB) model that are pairwise decomposable by side chain. These methods use reduced representations of the protein structure base...

A reduced graphene oxide (rGO)-sulfur composite aerogel with a compact self-assembled rGO skin was further modified by an atomic layer deposition (ALD) of ZnO or MgO layer, and used as a free-standing electrode material of a lithium-sulfur (Li-S) battery. The rGO skin and ALD-oxide coating worked as natural and artificial barriers to constrain the polysulfides within the cathode region. As a re...

In this manuscript, we report our investigation of anode materials for Li-ion batteries based on silicon-graphene oxide composites. Previous reports in the literature on silicon-graphene oxide (GO) composites as anodes have shown a large discrepancy between the electrochemical properties, mainly capacity and coulombic efficiency. In our research, the surface chemistry of Si nanoparticles has be...

For future applications in portable electronics, electric vehicles and grid storage, batteries with higher energy storage density than existing lithium ion batteries need to be developed. Recent efforts in this direction have focused on high-capacity electrode materials such as lithium metal, silicon and tin as anodes, and sulphur and oxygen as cathodes. Lithium metal would be the optimal choic...

Dendrite growth and low coulombic efficiency are two major factors that limit the utilization of Li metal electrodes in future generations of high-energy-density rechargeable batteries. This article reports the first study on metal–organic framework (MOF) materials for boosting the electrochemical performance of Li metal electrodes and demonstrates the power of molecular-structure functionaliza...