Synthesis of LiV3O8 nanocrystallites as cathode materials for lithium ion batteries

Lithium vanadium oxides were prepared by low heating solid-state method in which LiOH·H2O and NH4VO3 were used as starting reactants to synthesize a precursor containing Li and V, and then obtained the resulting products by calcining the precursor separately at 300, 400 and 500 °C for 6 h. Characterization by powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and thermo-gravimetric analysis (TGA) shows that these oxides are ascribed as same as that of crystalline layered lithiated trivanadate and the crystallinity, size and morphology of the LiV3O8 varied with calcined temperature. The LiV3O8 compound prepared by this synthesis method gave a good charge–discharge and cycle performance. A specific capacity of 342 mAh g−1 is obtained in the range of 1.8–3.8 V in the first cycle when the sample obtained at 300 °C. PEG added during the synthetic process makes the dimension of the particles uniform but does not affect the electrochemical properties of LiV3O8.