Rose flower-like NiCo2O4 with hierarchically porous structures for highly reversible lithium storage

• Hierarchical rose flower-like NiCo2O4 is facilely synthesized.
• The array electrode shows good integrity and porosity.
• The as-fabricated flower-like NiCo2O4 exhibits excellent electrochemical performance.

Hybrid nanostructured transition metal oxides have attracted great attention as high-performance electrode materials for next-generation lithium-ion batteries. In this work, novel porous NiCo2O4 nanoparticles are synthesized by a solvothermal method using poly (vinylpyrolidone) (PVP) as the structure-directing agent followed by a simple thermal annealing treatment. Through the XRD, FESEM, TEM, and N2 sorption analyses, it has been found that the as-prepared NiCo2O4 nanoparticles show hierarchical rose flower-like architecture constituted by 2D hierarchically porous nanosheets. The 2D porous nanosheets provide sufficient void space generated during thermal annealing treatment, benefiting electrolyte penetration and fast electron transfer. The porous structure also can tolerate the volume variation upon prolonged charge/discharge cycling. Therefore, when the as-prepared NiCo2O4 nanoparticles are used as anode materials for the Li-ion batteries, they exhibit high capacity, remarkable capacity retention at increased current densities, and outstanding cycling stability.

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