Hydrothermal synthesis and electrochemical properties of dispersed LiMnPO4 wedges

Abstract

A simple one-pot hydrothermal approach was employed to synthesise novel dispersed LiMnPO₄ wedges at 200 °C for 10 h. The phase and the morphology of the sample were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). It was shown that the morphology of the dispersed wedges could be directly tuned by varying the reagents amounts which altered the oversaturation of the solution and consequently the splitting rate as well as degree of LiMnPO₄ crystals. The dispersed wedges, the dendritic microspheres and the coarse dendritic microspheres were evaluated electrochemically by charge–discharge measurements. The results showed that the dispersed wedges displayed better electrochemical properties than those of the two microspheres, which could be reasonably ascribed to its great dispersibility and small crystal size. This study can open a new route to fabricating LiMnPO₄ crystals with designed morphology for lithium ion batteries.