Improving thermal stability of anode material LiCoVO₄ with Zn dopant

LiCoVO₄ looks promising as a good anode material in battery. Before it can be confidently employed in commercial battery, its thermal stability needs to be dependable. Suitable amount of zinc dopant appears to be able to ensure dependable thermal stability. The Zn-doped anode material LiCoVO₄ was synthesized for the first time with the citric acid sol-gel method. We investigated the influence of the variation of 'x' on the structure and thermal properties of the materials LiCo_1-xZn_xVO₄. The thermal properties and structure of LiCo_1-xZn_xVO₄ are characterized by means of DSC, TG and XRD. It is shown that the homogeneous high crystalline LiCoVO₄ is the product sintered at 450°C low temperature with the citric acid sol-gel method. After the Zn doping, the thermal behavior of the anode material LiCo_1-xZn_xVO₄ is changed and the thermal stability increases with increasing Zn dopant. When the Zn doping quantity x≤0.4, LiCo_1-xZn_xVO₄ features an inverse spinel structure. When x>0.4, the stray peaks begin to appear and the structure of the product is no longer singular.