On mechanochemical preparation of materials with enhanced characteristics for lithium batteries

Mechanical activation (MA) has been used to prepare high dispersed lithium-transition metal cathode materials and inorganic solid lithium-ion electrolytes for rechargeable lithium batteries. It has been shown that materials with low-dimensional (submicron) particles have notable advantages: i) for insertion electrodes, i.e. when the first electrochemical step is intercalation of Li+ ions (eg., LiMn2O4–3V, LiV3O8); ii) for cathodes with poor electronic conductivity (eg., LiFePO4); iii) for materials (electrodes and electrolytes) used in all solid state inorganic lithium batteries. Decreased particle size of as prepared cathodes leads to enhanced practical capacity because of increased quantity of particles that can be utilized, while the presence of structural disordering results in better structural stability upon intercalation of lithium ions and smoother discharge curves. The conductivity of the LiTi2(PO4)3 and Li1.3Al0.3Ti1.7(PO4)3 lithium-ion solid electrolytes prepared by using MA was of 2–3 order of magnitude higher than that for nonactivated samples owing to the absence of non-conductive impurities and lower grain boundary resistance.