Synthesis of porous carbon-coated polycrystalline Co9S8 for long-term lithium ion battery

Long-term stability still remains a big issue for metal sulfides anodes for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs). Porous nano-sized material possesses many advantages. Here, we have successfully synthesized the porous carbon-coated polycrystalline Co9S8 (C-CS), which exhibited a high specific capacity (841 mA h g−1) and good rate property (6.4 A g−1) for LIBs. In particular, C-CS electrode showed an excellent cycling stability at 2 A g−1 with a capacity retention of 84.7% after 400 cycles, demonstrating it a promising LIBs anode.