On-plane flexible and solid-state rechargeable lithium-MnO2 microbatteries from laser induced graphene

Abstract

[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] The thesis presents a flexible and solid state Li-MnO2 microbattery based on laser induced graphene (LIG) produced from commercial polyimide. To achieve this, interdigitated on-plane LIG electrodes were fabricated on commercial, flexible polyimide films. Then, Li and MnO2 were electrochemically deposited on LIG electrodes as anode and cathode materials respectively. Li-ion gel electrolyte was used to fabricate all solid-state, rechargeable flexible lithium-MnO2 microbattery. The first reversible capacity of the battery is 0.032 mAh/cm2 at 0.05 mA/cm2 and maintains about 80% of this value after 40 cycles while maintaining ~98% coulombic efficiency. The porous structure of LIG is thought to accommodate the volume change of active materials during charging / discharging thereby resulting in achieving the reversible capacity of the microbattery device. These devices show benefits of cost-effectiveness in manufacturing and promise of being used to power microelectronics.