Electrolyte Coordination Environments in Wide-Temperature Aqueous Metal Batteries: Mechanisms and Design Strategies

Abstract

Aqueous metal batteries (AMBs) are promising for energy storage attributed to intrinsic safety, low cost, and environmental friendliness. However, they degrade at extreme temperatures, i.e., crystallization at low temperature and evaporation or heat-driven side reactions at high temperature that have raised performance and safety concerns. Solving these challenges requires simultaneously thermodynamic and kinetic insights of electrolyte behavior under such conditions. Among various strategies, tuning intermolecular interactions to optimize the electrolyte coordination environments has been proven to be especially effective. Yet, comprehensive treatments that integrate both low- and high-temperature regulation with underlying the electrochemical mechanisms remain scarce. This review (i) dissects the failure modes of AMBs under extreme temperature conditions, (ii) synthesizes advances in molecular-interaction tuning for wide-temperature performance, and (iii) offers perspectives and design guidelines for future research and development.