Room temperature solvent-free reduction of SiCl4 to nano-Si for high-performance Li-ion batteries†
Abstract
SiCl4 can be directly reduced to nano-Si with commercial Na metal under solvent-free conditions by mechanical milling. Crystalline nano-Si with an average size of 25 nm and quite uniform size distribution can be obtained, which shows excellent lithium storage performance, for a high reversible capacity of 1600 mA h g−1 after 500 cycles at 2.1 A g−1.