Ionic Liquid-Directed Nanoporous TiNb₂O₇ Anodes with Superior Performance for Fast-Rechargeable Lithium-Ion Batteries

Nanoporous TiNb₂O₇ (NPTNO) material is synthesized by a sol–gel method with an ionic liquid (IL) as the nanoporous structure directing template. NPTNO exhibits a high reversible capacity of 210 mAh g^–1 even at the charging rate of 50 C and an excellent cyclability of half-cell capacity retention of 74% for 1000 cycles at 5 C and LiNi_0.5Mn_1.5O₄-coupled full-cell capacity retentions of 81% and 87% for 1000 cycles at 1 C and 2 C, respectively. The studies of the 1000 cycled NPTNO electrode illustrate that the IL-directed mesoporous structure can enhance the cyclability of NPTNO cells due to the alleviation of repetitive mechanical stress and volume fluctuation induced by the repetitive Li⁺ insertion-extraction processes. The measured Li⁺ diffusion coefficients from the galvanostatic intermittent titration technique suggest that the IL-templating strategy indeed ensures the fast rechargeability of NPTNO cells based on the fast Li⁺ diffusion kinetics. Benefitting from the nanoporous structure, NPTNO with unhindered Li⁺ diffusion pathways achieves a superior rate capability in the titanium-based oxide materials and the best full-cell cyclability in the TNO materials. Therefore, the templating potential of IL is demonstrated, and the superb electrochemical performance establishes the IL-directed NPTNO as a promising anode candidate for fast-rechargeable LIBs.