Symposium ES04-Metal Anodes in Rechargeable Batteries—Electrolyte, Interface and Mechanism

Metals (Li, Na, Mg, Ca, Zn, etc.) are the next-generation anodes to achieve high-energy-density rechargeable batteries. However, the reversible plating and stripping of metal anodes is plagued by the unstable electrolyte|electrode interface, which is manifested in the continuously evolving solid electrolyte interphase (SEI), as well as electrically disconnected metal following nonuniform stripping of highly porous and branched deposits. Tackling these challenges requires a systematic approach that integrates fundamental knowledge of interfacial processes and metal growth mechanisms with rational electrolyte and substrate design.

This timely symposium will cover the latest advances on metal anodes in the following aspects: 1) Fundamental understanding of the formation mechanism, composition, structure, and function of the SEI; 2) Mechanistic understanding revealing the growth and dissolution mechanisms of metal deposits and their dependence on the operation conditions (current, pressure, temperature) and chemistry (electrolyte, substrate); 3) Advanced electrolyte and substrate design for achiving highly reversible metal anodes; 4) Advanced characterization methods and tools that enable new insights to fill the above-mentioned knowledge gaps; and 5) Manufacturing and scaling up metallic anodes in the battery industry . The symposium aims to stimulate constructive discussions and foster collaboration between experts on these different topics. Synergizing these five complementary thrusts will facilitate connections among atomic and molecular scale understanding and design of electrolyte/SEI structure, meso-scale reaction/transport phenomena that support metal deposition and stripping, and device-scale engineering efforts.

The necessity of a sperate symposium on metal anodes lies in several asepects: 1) the research on metal anodes spans different subtopics of material science, such as metal material, ceramic materials, carbon material, polymer material, liquids, characterization, computation, interfacial chemistry, etc, which can not be simply covered by any other existing topics. 2) metal anodes are regarded as the holy-grail of battery research, and significant progress were made in the past few years in different aspects of this topic, but there was no dedicated symposium that can bring the experts on this topic together.