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Full Record Details
Persistent URL
http://purl.org/net/epubs/work/52647
Record Status
Checked
Record Id
52647
Title
Muon spin relaxation studies of lithium nitridometallate battery materials : muon trapping and lithium ion diffusion
Contributors
AS Powell (Nottingham U.)
,
JS Lord (STFC Rutherford Appleton Lab.)
,
DH Gregory (Glasgow U.)
,
JJ Titman (Nottingham U.)
Abstract
Lithium nitride has a unique layered structure and the highest reported Li+ ion conductivity for a crystalline material. The conductivity is highly anisotropic, with an intralayer contribution within the graphitic [Li2N] planes dominant at ambient temperature. In this paper transverse- and zero-field muon spin relaxation (μSR) studies on Li3N and two novel paramagnetic derivatives Li3−x−yNixN with x = 0.36 and 0.57 are reported. These new materials have potential as anodes in rechargeable lithium batteries. The decrease in the muon depolarization rate observed above 180 K for the three materials is shown to arise from motional narrowing due to intralayer Li+ diffusion. The increase in the measured activation energy with x for Li3−x−yNixN suggests that the reduction in the layer spacing that results at high substitution levels is responsible for raising the energy barrier to Li+ jumps, despite the concomitant expansion of the [Li2N] plane. In addition, the onset of interlayer diffusion appears at lower temperatures in Ni-substituted derivatives than in the parent Li3N. The muons themselves are quasi-static, most probably located in a 4h site between the [Li2N] plane and the Li(1)/Ni layer. This is similar to the Li+ interstitial position identified by molecular dynamics simulations as an intermediate for an exchange mechanism for interlayer diffusion. Finally, μSR gives no evidence for the formation of the muonium equivalent of the hydrogen defects thought to play an important role in intralayer diffusion in Li3N. These results demonstrate that μSR can be used to obtain diffusion coefficients and activation energies for Li+ transport even in paramagnetic materials where NMR studies are complicated by strong interactions with the electronic moments.
Organisation
ISIS
,
ISIS-MuSR
,
STFC
Keywords
Materials
,
Chemistry
Funding Information
Related Research Object(s):
Licence Information:
Language
English (EN)
Type
Details
URI(s)
Local file(s)
Year
Journal Article
J Phys Chem C
113, no. 48 (2009): 20758-20763.
doi:10.1021/jp9091249
2009
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