Optimizing <i>s–p</i> Orbital Overlap Between Sodium Polysulfides and Single‐Atom Indium Catalyst for Efficient Sulfur Redox Reaction
P-block metal carbon-supported single-atom catalysts (C-SACs) have emerged as a promising candidate for high-performance room-temperature sodium-sulfur (RT Na-S) batteries, due to their high atom utilization and unique electronic structure. However, the ambiguous electronic-level understanding of Na-dominant s-p hybridization between sodium polysulfides (NaPSs) and p-block C-SACs limits the precise control of coordination environment tuning and electro-catalytic activity manipulation. Here, s-p orbital overlap degree (OOD) between the s orbitals of Na in NaPSs and the p orbitals of p-block C-SACs is proposed as a descriptor for sulfur reduction reaction (SRR) and sulfur oxidation reaction (SOR). Compared to NG and NG-supported InN<sub>4</sub> (NG-InN<sub>4</sub>) SACs, the nitrogen-doped graphene-supported InN<sub>5</sub> (NG-InN<sub>5</sub>) SACs show the largest s-p OOD, demonstrating the weakest shuttle effect and the lowest reaction energy barriers in both SRR and SOR. Accordingly, the designed catalysts allow the Na-S pouch batteries to retain a high capacity of 490.7 mAh g<sup>-1</sup> at 2 A g<sup>-1</sup> with a Coulombic efficiency of 96 % at a low electrolyte/sulfur (E/S) ratio of 4.5 μl mg<sup>-1</sup>. This work offers an s-p orbital overlap descriptor describing the interaction between NaPSs and p-orbital-dominated catalysts for high-performance RT Na-S batteries.
Authors
- Chunnian He (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5768-6598)
- Wenbin Hu
- Guangmin Zhou (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3629-5686)
- Enzuo Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3331-2532)
- Haichang Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3517-7394)
- Tianshuai Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9453-0090)
- Jing Mao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1122-5438)
- Chunsheng Shi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3374-1449)
- Zhoujie Lao
- Guangxuan Wu
- Tongfeng Liu
- Naiqin Zhao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3725-0279)
- Biao Chen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6181-2155)
- Yihao Cheng (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6307-5657)
- Ningning Wu
Institutions
- Tianjin University of Technology and Education (CN)
- Tianjin University (CN)
- Northwestern Polytechnical University (CN)
- Hebei University of Technology (CN)
- Tsinghua–Berkeley Shenzhen Institute (CN)
- Tianjin Energy Investment Group (China) (CN)
- Tsinghua University (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Angewandte Chemie International Edition
- Published
- 2024-12-16
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.202422208
- Citations
- 38
- Primary Topic
- Chemical Synthesis and Reactions
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 9.50