New paper published in Carbon on monitoring the thermally induced transition from sp3-hybridized into sp2-hybridized. This work was done in collaboration with the group of Bernd Smarsly (Justus Liebig Universität Gießen, Germany).
New paper published in Nature Communications on the energy storage mechanisms of iodide redox electrolytes. This work was done in collaboration with TU Graz (among others: Christian Prehal & Qamar Abbas).
New paper published in Advanced Science on the enhanced desalination performance of Ag-MXene hybrid electrode materials operated as an membrane desalination device. This work was done in collaboration with Jie Ma (Tongji University).
New paper published in Chemical Communications on the novel synthesis of MXene via ionic liquids. This process replaces the use of HF or LiF/HCl mixtures. The work was done in collaboration with Michael Naguib (Tulane University) and the Leibniz INP (Greifswald).
New review article published in Chemical Reviews on pseudocapacitors, their science, material perspectives, and applications. This work was done in collaboration with Veronica Augustyn (NC State University), Cheng Zhan (Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory), and De-en Jiang (University of California).
New article published in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces with the title “Self-sustained visible-light-driven electrochemical redox desalination”. This work was highly collaborative, including T. D. Waite (UNSW Sidney), and as lead scientist Fuming Chen (South China Normal University).
New paper published in Nature Reviews Materials on electrochemical desalination for the removal of ions (ranging from removal of undesired ions to elemental recovery and advanced ion management). The paper was created in collaboration with Doron Aurbach (Bar-Ilan University), Jeyong Yoon (Seoul National University), and Xiao Su (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign).
New paper published in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces on the use of MXene paired with activated carbon for electrochemical desalination. Probing low and high salinity levels, our work demonstrates the permselectivity of MXene and the synergetic added-value of MXene surface functional groups to boost the desalination performance.
New paper published in ACS Applied Energy Materials on the use of niobium carbide as a facile precursor for tailored niobium oxide / carbon hybrid electrode materials for high performance lithium-ion batteries. The work was done in collaboration with Saarland University (Guido Kickelbick), TU Darmstadt (Bastian J. M. Etzold), and the Leibniz Institute for Plasma Science and Technology.
New paper published in ChemSusChem on dual-zinc-ion desalination. The system consists of two zinc foils as redox electrodes with flowing ZnCl2 electrolyte; thereby, the system holds the promising of being continued to be developed for continuous operation. The work was done in collaboration with Fuming Chen (South China Normal University).
New paper published in Electrochemistry Communications on utilization of zinc air battery (ZAB) technology for innovative use as high performance desalination device. The resulting zinc air desalination (ZAD) unit is the first of a novel family of metal air battery desalination systems that show a very high desalination capacity.
New paper published in Journal of Materials Chemistry A on the vital role of the properties of carbon as the conductive additive in Sb-conversion sodium-ion batteries. The homogeneity, morphology, size, and other properties of the carbon additive enable (or defy) high electrochemical performance and stability.
New paper published in Sustainable Energy & Fuels on the expected permselectivity of sub-nanometer pores of activated carbon. This effect enables membrane-free use of carbon electrodes for seawater desalination even at high molar strength, such as presented by seawater. This complementary work brings together modeling from the group of Guang Feng (Huazhong University of Science and Technology) and experimental work from our team.
New paper published in ACS Nano on ionic structure transition within carbon nanopores that enhance the charge/discharge kinetics of electrical double-layer capacitors. Different from the traditional view that a smaller pore results in slower charging, a non-monotonic relation is found between the charging rate and pore size, in which the charging process is accelerated in some sub-1-nm pores. This work was done in collaboration with Guang Feng (Huazhong University of Science and Technology) and Yury Gogotsi (Drexel University).
New paper published in Electrochimica Acta on the influence and best-choice of electrolytes (organic / ionic liquid) when using hybrid supercapacitors operated at 2.8 V. The datae xplore below-ambient and above-ambient temperatures and demonstrates 3-methoxypropionitrile and mixed organic electrolytes as promising ones for specific performance regimes.
New paper published in Desalination. The work with the title “Polymer ion-exchange membranes for capacitive deionization of aqueous media with low and high salt concentration” investigates the desalination performance of ion-exchange membranes coated directly onto carbon electrodes with free-standing ion-exchange membranes at high and low molar strenght. The data show that MCDI enables reasonable desalination even of highly concentrated solutions. The work was done in collaboration with Markus Gallei (Saarland University).
New paper published in Journal of Power Sources on the synthesis of vanadium sulfide / carbon electrospun, free-standing, binder-free electrodes for lithium-ion battery application. This work was in collaboration with the Max-Planck Institute for Iron Research (Christina Scheu) and the Leibniz Institute for Plasma Science and Technology (Angela Kruth).
New paper published in the Journal of the Electrochemical Society on the electrochemisorption of hydrogen and deuterium in carbon nanopores of different pore size. This work was in collaboration with Guang Feng (Huazhong University of Science and Technology).
New paper published in Carbon on the synthesis and electrochemical application of carbon spherogels. This work was in collaboration with the group of Nicolas Hüsing (spearheaded by Michael Elsaesser) at the Paris Lodron University of Salzburg, Austria.
New paper published in Sustainable Energy & Fuels on titanium niobium oxide / carbon hybrids and composites. Our work demonstrates that well-designed metal oxide / carbon interfaces are of high importance as well as careful phase analysis; it is not suitable to generalize statements like “hybrids are always better than composites”.