Cooperative Co single atoms and Co2P nanoparticles as catalytic tandem for boosting redox kinetics in Li-S batteries

Notorious shuttle effect and sluggish redox kinetics as major bottlenecks have nowadays hindered the commercial implementation of lithium-sulfur batteries. The activity design of catalysts has attracted increasing attention in this realm thus far. Herein, we devise a Co-based electrocatalytic tandem (Co -N -P) encompassing (N,P)-coordinated Co single atoms and Co2P nanoparticles for guiding the dualdirectional sulfur evolution reactions. Such a Co -N -P tandem synergizes high atom utilization, large catalyst loading, and smooth charge migration, thereby resulting in high activity for dictating the Li2S nucleation and decomposition. As a result, the full cell incorporating the Co-N-P-modified separator harvests 0.1 % capacity decay after 500 cycles at 1.0 C. In addition, a favorable areal capacity output of 4.2 mAh/cm2 is obtained under a sulfur loading of 5.3 mg/cm2. We anticipate that this work would offer insight into the hybrid catalyst design affording high activity and stability for emerging energy applications. (c) 2024 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.