Feather duster liked CeO2 as efficient adsorber host material for advanced lithium–sulfur batteries

Abstract Many kinds of host materials have been investigated to deal with the issues of the Lithium–Sulfur batteries, such as poor electronic conductivity and severe capacity fade during the electrochemical cycles. Among various host materials, metal oxides have become a promising host material due to their strong adsorption ability for the soluble polysulfide. Herein, feather duster liked CeO2 ceramics (FDCO) are synthesized via hydrothermal reaction with high surface area (198 m2 g−1). While the sulfur is immersed into the feather duster liked CeO2, the as-prepared FDCO/S composites show superior capacity of 1436 mAh g−1 at 0.1 C and a low capacity decay of 0.041% per cycle after 500 cycles at 2 C. The superior electrochemical performance is attributed to the strong chemical bond of polysulfide to CeO2, as well as the mesopores in the CeO2 matrix.