Binder and conductive additive free silicon electrode architectures for advanced lithium-ion batteries

This manuscript presents binder and conducting additive free Silicon nanoparticles (Si-NPs) as anodes for lithium-ion batteries. The Si-NPs are pressure embed onto copper foil current collector without using any organic binder or conductive carbon additive. It presents physical and structural studies by XRD, SEM, Raman, TEM and electrochemical performance of Si-NPs by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and galvanostatic charge-discharge cycling. Binder-free Si-NP electrodes exhibit an initial reversible capacity of 950 mAh g−1 at C/10 rate and more than 650 mAh g−1 during 500 cycles at C/2 rate. The electrodes shows excellent rate capability (800 mAh g−1 at 5 C rate) and cycling stability, because of available free space for volume change during cycling of silicon NPs without pulverization. The binder-free anode fabrication enables Si-NPs to obtain the real capacity of silicon without any interference of capacity contribution from composite materials.