Porous Mo2C nanofibers with high conductivity as an efficient sulfur host for highly-stable lithium-sulfur batteries

Abstract Lithium-sulfur batteries is promising for the next-generation advanced energy storage systems, which have attracted a great deal of attention in recent years. However, the majority of substrates with both high electronic conductivity and full coverage of adsorption-catalysis synergy are difficult to achieve. Here, porous Mo2C nanofibers are successfully synthesized via using carbon fiber as a hard template, which Mo2C nanofibers as substrates exhibit high electron conductivity and fully covered adsorption sites. The cathode delivers an initial discharge capacity of ≈1080 mA h g−1 (at 0.1 C), and shows highly exposed (121) plane of Mo2C for anchoring and catalyzing Li2S. The excellent electrochemical performance indicates that the design offers a sample and practical avenue to develop highly-stable lithium-sulfur batteries.