Silicon–carbon anodes have demonstrated great potential as an anode material for lithium-ion batteries because they have perfectly improved the problems that existed in silicon anodes, such as the particle pulverization, shedding and failures of electrochemical performance during lithiation and delithiation.
A well-defined silicon nanocone–carbon structure for demonstrating exclusive influences of carbon coating on silicon anode of lithium-ion batteries. ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces 9, 2806–2814 (2017) Wang, B., Qiu, T., Li, X., et al.: Synergistically engineered self-standing silicon/carbon composite arrays as high performance lithium battery anodes.
A comprehensive review of the lithium-ion battery anodes based on silicon is presented and discussed in terms of successful approaches leading to more durable silicon-based nanocomposite architectures that can potentially overcome the existing limitations of the silicon-based anodes.
Although silicon-based materials have a large specific capacity, they have not yet been widely used in lithium-ion batteries. The main reason is that the large volume change of silicon leads to poor cycle performance. The current solution is to prepare materials into nanoscale and form composite materials.
Sohn, H., Kim, D.H., Yi, R., et al.: Semimicro-size agglomerate structured silicon-carbon composite as an anode material for high performance lithium-ion batteries. J. Power Sources 334, 128–136 (2016)
In addition, Si/C materials formed by silicon and different carbon-based materials is summarized, where the influences of carbons on the electrochemical performance of silicon are emphasized.