AN ULTRAFAST RECHARGEABLE ALUMINIUM-ION BATTERY

There is an academic paper on the LETTER page of the world's earliest international scientific and technological journal "NATURE", called “An ultrafast rechargeable aluminium-ion battery”. In the academic paper, Dasen’s pyrolytic graphite sheet was used to make the electrochemical measurements.

A Swagelok-type cell (1/2 inch diameter) was constructed using a 4mg PG foil (0.017mm, Suzhou Dasen Electronics Materials) cathode and a 90mg Al foil (0.25mm, Alfa Aesar) anode. Please check the method in the attachment.

METHODS

Preparation of ionic liquid electrolytes.Aroomtemperature ionic liquid electrolytewas made by mixing 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride ([EMIm]Cl, 97%,Acros Chemicals) and anhydrous aluminium chloride (AlCl3, 99.999%, SigmaAldrich). [EMIm]Cl was baked at 130°C under vacuum for 16–32 h to removeresidualwater. ([EMIm]AlxCly) ionic liquid electrolytes were prepared in an argonatmosphereglove box (both [EMIm]Cl and AlCl3 are highly hygroscopic) by mixinganhydrous AlCl3 with [EMIm]Cl, and the resulting light-yellow, transparent liquidwas stirred at room temperature for 10 min. The mole ratio of AlCl3 to [EMIm]Clwas varied from 1.1 to 1.8. The water content of the ionic liquid was determined(500–700 p.p.m.) using a coulometric Karl Fischer titrator, DL39 (Mettler Toledo).The predominant anions in basic melts (AlCl3/[EMIm]Cl mole ratio<1) are CI¯

and AlCl4¯, while in acidic melts (AlCl3/[EMIm]Cl mole ratio>1) chloroaluminateanions such as Al2Cl7¯,Al3Cl10¯, andAl4Cl13¯are formed11.Theratioofanionsto cations in the AlCl3/[EMIm]Cl electrolyte was determined using a glass fibre filterpaper (Whatman GF/D) loaded with a 4–8 mmAu-coated SiO2 beads21 in a cuvettecell (0.35 ml, Starna Cells) with random orientation quartz windows. Then, in theglove box, the cuvette cell was filled with AlCl3/[EMIm]Cl5=1.3 (bymole). Ramanspectra (200–650 cm-1) were obtained using a 785-nmlaser with 2 cm–1 resolution.Raman data were collected from the surface of the Au-coated SiO2 bead so as tobenefit from surface enhanced Raman21,22 (Extended Data Fig. 2b).