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Updated: Feb 11, 2026

Zinc-Sponge Battery Electrodes that Suppress Dendrites
Published on: September 29, 2020
Aqueous rechargeable zinc/sodium vanadate batteries with enhanced performance from simultaneous insertion of dual
Fang Wan1, Linlin Zhang1, Xi Dai1
1Key Laboratory of Advanced Energy Materials Chemistry (Ministry of Education), College of Chemistry, Nankai University, Tianjin, 300071, P. R. China.
Abstract:
Rechargeable aqueous zinc-ion batteries are promising energy storage devices due to their high safety and low cost. However, they remain in their infancy because of the limited choice of positive electrodes with high capacity and satisfactory cycling performance. Furthermore, their energy storage mechanisms are not well established yet. Here we report a highly reversible zinc/sodium vanadate system, where sodium vanadate hydrate nanobelts serve as positive electrode and zinc sulfate aqueous solution with sodium sulfate additive is used as electrolyte. Different from conventional energy release/storage in zinc-ion batteries with only zinc-ion insertion/extraction, zinc/sodium vanadate hydrate batteries possess a simultaneous proton, and zinc-ion insertion/extraction process that is mainly responsible for their excellent performance, such as a high reversible capacity of 380 mAh g-1 and capacity retention of 82% over 1000 cycles. Moreover, the quasi-solid-state zinc/sodium vanadate hydrate battery is also a good candidate for flexible energy storage device.
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