Hierarchical NiMn-LDH Hollow Spheres as a Promising Pseudocapacitive Electrode for Supercapacitor Application

Abstract

Layered double hydroxides (LDH) are regarded as attractive pseudocapacitive materials due to their impressive capacitive qualities that may be adjustable to their morphological features. However, the layered structure of LDH renders them susceptible to structural aggregation, which inhibits effective electrolyte transport and limits their practical applicability after limited exposure to active areas. Herein, we propose a simple template-free strategy to synthesize hierarchical hollow sphere NiMn-LDH material with high surface area and exposed active as anode material for supercapacitor application. The template-free approach enables the natural nucleation of Ni-Mn ions resulting in thin sheets that self-assemble into a hollow sphere, offering expended interlayer spaces and abundant redox-active active sites. The optimal NiMn-LDH-12 achieved a specific capacitance of 1010.4 F g−1 at a current density of 0.2 A g−1 with capacitance retention of 70% at 5 A g−1 after 5000 cycles with lower charge transfer impedance. When configured into an asymmetric supercapacitors (ASC) device as NiMn-LDH//AC, the material realized a specific capacitance of 192.4 F g−1 at a current density of 0.2 A g−1 with a good energy density of 47.9 Wh kg−1 and a power density of 196.8 W kg−1. The proposed morphological-tuning route is promising for designing template-free NiMn-LDHs spheres with practical pseudocapacitive characteristics.