High Pseudocapacitance in FeOOH/rGO Composites with Superior Performance for High Rate Anode in Li-Ion Battery

Capacitive storage has been considered as one type of Li-ion storage with fast faradaic surface redox reactions to offer high power density for electrochemical applications. However, it is often limited by low extent of energy contribution during the charge/discharge process, providing insufficient influences to total capacity of Li-ion storage in electrodes. In this work, we demonstrate a pseudocapacitance predominated storage (contributes 82% of the total capacity) from an in-situ pulverization process of FeOOH rods on rGO (reduced graphene oxide) sheets for the first time. Such high extent of pseudocapacitive storage in the FeOOH/rGO electrode achieves high energy density with superior cycling performance over 200 cycles at different current densities (1135 mAh/g at 1 A/g and 783 mAh/g at 5 A/g). It is further revealed that the in-situ pulverization process is essential for the high pseudocapacitance in this electrode, because it not only produces a porous structure for high exposure of tiny FeOOH crystallites to electrolyte but also maintains stable electrochemical contact during ultrahigh rate charge transfer with high energy density in the battery. The utilization of in-situ pulverization in an Fe-based anode to realize high surface pseudocapacitance with superior performance may inspire future design of electrode structures in Li-ion batteries.