Ultrafine nanoporous aluminum by electrolytic dealloying of aluminum-magnesium alloys in glyme-based electrolytes with recovery of sacrificial magnesium. (December 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Lee, Timothy; Koh, Hyeongjun; Ng, Alexander K.; Liu, Jiaxin; Stach, Eric A.; Detsi, Eric
• Is Part Of: Scripta materialia. Number 221(2022)
• Publication Date: 2022-12
• Subjects: Metal fuel -- Air-free synthesis -- Electrolytic dealloying -- Nanoporous aluminum -- Recovery of sacrificial materials; Materials -- Periodicals; Metallurgy -- Periodicals; Metalen; Legeringen; Materiaalkunde; Metals, metalworking and machinery industries; Metals; Electronic journals; 620.11
• DOI: 10.1016/j.scriptamat.2022.114959
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1359-6462

Abstract

Abstract: Air-free electrolytic dealloying using non-aqueous electrolytes is a sustainable method for creating nanoporous Al (NP-Al) with highly reactive nanoscale-sized ligaments from Al-Mg parent alloys while simultaneously recovering the sacrificial Mg. However, this synthesis strategy is limited in versatility by the low number of available non-aqueous electrolytes that can conduct Mg ions and has so far only been proven to work with all-phenyl complex (APC) electrolyte derived from in situ reaction between two equivalents of Lewis base C₆H₅ClMg and one equivalent of Lewis acid AlCl3 in tetrahydrofuran (THF) solvent. Here we demonstrated that a new electrolyte consisting of MgCl2 /AlCl3 /Mg(TFSI)2 (or MACT) in glyme-based solvents recently introduced in the Mg-ion battery community can also be used to create NP-Al. This alternative electrolyte exhibits higher electrochemical performance than APC and can create ultrafine NP-Al with ≈ 6–14 nm ligament size, which is smaller than the ≈ 10–20 nm ligament size commonly achieved using APC. Graphical abstract: Image, graphical abstract