Call for Papers

Please contact the symposium organizers with questions.

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.

Topics will include:

• Formation mechanism, composition, structure, and function of SEI
• Growth and dissolution mechanisms of metal deposits
• Advanced electrolyte and substrate for highly reversible metal anodes
• Advanced characterization methods and tools for metal anodes
• Engineering and Manufacturing of rechargeable metal batteries
• Modeling and theoretical understanding of metal anodes
• Crosstalk between metal anodes and cathode materials

Invited Speakers (tentative):

• Lynden Archer (Cornell University, USA)
• Perla Balbuena (Texas A&M University, USA)
• Yi Cui (Stanford University, USA)
• Chengcheng Fang (Michigan State University, USA)
• Maximilian Fitchner (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany)
• Claire Grey (Cambridge University, United Kingdom)
• Axel Groß (Universität Ulm, Germany)
• Katherine Harrison (Sandia National Laboratories, USA)
• Kelsey Hatzell (Princeton University, USA)
• Timo Jacob (Universität Ulm, Germany)
• Katherine Jungjohann (National Renewable Energy Laboratory, USA)
• Robert Kostecki (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, USA)
• Bryan McCloskey (University of California, Berkeley, USA)
• Y. Shirley Meng (The University of Chicago, USA)
• Munekazu Motoyama (Nagoya University, Japan)
• Stefano Passerini (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany)
• Debra Rolison (U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, USA)
• Kimberley See (California Institute of Technology, USA)
• Kang Xu (U.S. Army Research Laboratory, USA)
• Atsuo Yamada (The University of Tokyo, Japan)
• Jiguang Zhang (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, USA)

Symposium Organizers