Structural properties of nanostructured lithium manganese oxide as cathode in lithium ion batteries

Abstract

Lithium manganese oxide, LiMn2O4 is one of the most promising cathode materials for lithium secondary batteries due to its low cost and environmental benign. LiMn2O4 nanorods have been successfully prepared via sol-gel method using citric acid as chelating agent while polycarbonate membrane as the template. The template was soaked in LiMn2O4 sol and dried for 48 hours before calcined in air at 400°C for 5 hours. These nanorod arrays aligned almost parallel to each other with average diameter and length of 150 nm and 8 µm, respectively. The thermal behavior of LiMn2O4 precursor and polycarbonate membrane were analyzed prior to LiMn2O4 nanorods preparation. BET surface area measurement showed that LiMn2O4 nanorods have large surface area of 44.83 m2/g. The nanorod surface area was higher than those prepared LiMn2O4 nanosized particles. X-Ray diffraction results demonstrated that LiMn2O4 nanorods material has the spinel LiMn2O4 phase with no impurities and the stoichiometry resembled LiMn2O4