Stimulating Zn2+ permselectivity for prominent zinc anode reversibility by designing a self-assembled artificial layer

Although zinc anodes are extensively adopted to meet aqueous energy storage, serious dendrite formation and side reaction resulting in inferior lifetime have hindered the application. In this work, a unique interfacial engineering is proposed by a self-assembled artificial layer tightly contact to the surface of zinc anode with Zn 2+ permselectivity. Such artificial layer via a facile hydrolysis consists of nano inorganic particles well dispersed in organic network. The screening for the bound water of Zn 2+ enables excellent anticorrosion during cycling and rest situation. Meanwhile, the modified zinc anode can reduce the Zn 2+ nucleation barrier for uniform distribution, which is beneficial to dendrite suppression. Consequently, the modified zinc anodes in both symmetric and full cells exhibit prominently electrochemical reversibility. Specifically, with a cycling area capacity of 3.0 mAh cm −2 at 1.0 mA cm −2 , the modified zinc anode can tolerate superior plating/stripping behavior over 1000 h. When it is coupled with vanadium pentoxide cathode, the performance advantage of the modified full-cell is still impressive and high-capacity retention of ∼84 % after 1200 cycles is achieved.