Key Takeaways & Executive Findings
- •• Carbon microdomain engineering using ion-mediated structural control tailors oriented high-activity nitrogen species and creates specific closed pores. • This strategy accelerates sodium-ion desolvation kinetics, thereby enhancing sodium storage performance even at high current densities. • The optimized carbon material achieves exceptional rate performance and cycling stability, making it one of the top-tier materials for sodium-ion batteries. • The MEC3||expanded graphite dual-ion battery demonstrates unprecedented cycling stability with 80.6% capacity retention after 10,000 cycles at 10 C.
Abstract
Sodium-based dual-ion batteries (SDIBs) have been attracting increasing attention in recent years owing to their low cost, environmental benignancy, and high operating voltage. However, the sluggish ion kinetics of conventional carbon anodes that cannot match the fast capacitive anion intercalation behavior of graphite cathodes constraints on improving power density of SDIBs. Herein, we present an ingenious carbon microdomain engineering strategy to fabricate high-performance carbon anode with ion-mediated high-activity nitrogen species and molecular-scale closed-pore architectures. Experimental characterizations and theoretical investigations demonstrate that Zn2+-mediated structural engineering tailors oxidized nitrogen species, which proficiently accelerate the sodium-ion desolvation kinetics; meanwhile the acetate-mediated pore-forming process modulates closed pores, which synergistically afford abundant sodium storage sites for high plateau-region capacity. As a result, the optimized microdomain engineered carbon material (MEC3) tailored with the optimal amount of zinc acetate demonstrates an outstanding plateau-region capacity of 253 mAh g−1 even at 1 C, among the highest reported values. Consequently, the MEC3||expanded graphite dual-ion battery exhibits an unprecedented cycling stability at high current rate, maintaining 80.6% capacity retention after 10,000 cycles at 10 C, among the best reports. This microdomain engineering strategy provides a new design principle for overcoming kinetic limitations of carbonaceous materials in plateau-dominated sodium storage systems.
1. Introduction
Although lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) are widely used in portable electronics and electric vehicles, the rising cost and limited resources of lithium hinder the broader and long-term application especially in the grid-scale energy storage fields. As a more economical and abundant option, sodium-ion based energy storage devices are considered as promising candidates for large-scale energy storage. Among them, sodium-based dual-ion batteries (SDIBs), which usually employ graphite cathodes and carbon anodes, hold significant promise owing to their merits of low cost, environmental benignancy, and high working voltage.
However, the sluggish ion kinetics of common carbon anodes cannot satisfy the rapid capacitive anion intercalation behavior of graphite cathodes. Additionally, their sodium storage capacity is relatively low due to the limited active sites. These limitations restrict the achievable power density and energy density of SDIBs. Therefore, developing appropriate anode materials that simultaneously offer high capacity and fast rate capability is imperative to push forward the practical application of SDIBs.
Among the various anode materials including graphite, amorphous carbon, nano-carbon, transition metal-based materials, alloy materials, and organic materials, hard carbon materials are the most promising and have been commercially applied anodes owing to their advantages of abundant precursor sources, short-range order graphene-like layers, tunable pore structures, enlarged interlayer spacing, etc. The electrochemical sodium storage behavior in hard carbon materials typically exhibits two distinct voltage-dependent regions: (i) a low-voltage plateau region (<0.15 V vs. Na+/Na), where capacity originates primarily from sodium metal filling of carbon.
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Bin Tang, Yuchen Zhang, Bifa Ji, Geng Yu, Yongping Zheng, Xiaolong Zhou, Nuntaporn Kamonsutthipaijit, Pornsuwan Buangam, Sarayut Tunmee, Hideki Nakajima, Ukit Rittihong, Qingguang Pan, Fan Zhang, Yongbing Tang (2026). Ion-Mediated Carbon Microdomain Engineering Boosting Enhanced Plateau Capacity of Carbon Anode under High Rate Towards High-Performance Sodium Dual-Ion Batteries. Nano-Micro Letters. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40820-025-02008-4
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Frequently Asked Questions
What is the main challenge addressed in this paper?
The main challenge is the sluggish ion kinetics of conventional carbon anodes in sodium-based dual-ion batteries, which limits power density and capacity.
How does the proposed carbon microdomain engineering strategy work?
The strategy uses ion-mediated structural control to tailor high-activity nitrogen species and create closed pores, which accelerate sodium-ion desolvation kinetics and provide abundant sodium storage sites.
What are the key performance metrics of the optimized carbon material (MEC3)?
MEC3 achieves an outstanding plateau-region capacity of 253 mAh g−1 at 1 C, and the MEC3||expanded graphite dual-ion battery maintains 80.6% capacity retention after 10,000 cycles at 10 C.
What is the significance of this work for sodium-ion batteries?
This work provides a new design principle for overcoming kinetic limitations of carbonaceous materials, enabling high-performance sodium storage at high rates, which is crucial for practical SDIB applications.
Which materials were used in the study?
The study used hard carbon anodes engineered with zinc acetate as an ion mediator, and expanded graphite as the cathode in the dual-ion battery configuration.
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