Lithiophilic Silver Coating on Lithium Metal Surface for Inhibiting Lithium Dendrites.

Li metal batteries (LMBs) are known as the ideal energy storage candidates for the future rechargeable batteries due to the high energy density. However, uncontrolled Li dendrites growing during charge/discharge process causes extremely low coulombic efficiency and short lifespan. In this work, a thin lithiophilic layer of Ag was coated on the bare Li surface via a thermal evaporation method, which alleviated volume variations and suppressed Li dendrites growth during cycling. As a result, a long lifespan of 250 h at a current density of 1 mA cm-2 was achieved in the symmetric cell when using the Ag-modified Li foil (Ag@Li). The LiFePO4|Li full cell demonstrated an excellent cycling performance with a high specific capacity of 131 mAh g-1 even after 300 cycles at 0.5 C. This study offers a suitable method for stabilizing Li metal anodes in LMBs.

The complete chloroplast genome sequence of Dendrobium zhenghuoense (Orchidaceae).

Dendrobium zhenghuoense is very distinctive among Orchidaceae species with yellowish-green flowers and short peduncle. In this study, we reported the complete chloroplast genome of D. zhenghuoense. Present study suggests that genomic information of D. zhenghuoense would have special importance in conservation and molecular phylogenetic studies on Orchidaceae. The circle genome of D. zhenghuoense was 148,431 bp in length with 37.0% GC content and a large single-copy (LSC) region of 84,167 bp, a small single-copy (SSC) region of 12,588 bp, which were separated by a pair of inverted repeat (IR) region of 25,838 bp. The genome contained 130 genes, including 75 protein-coding genes, 38 tRNA genes and 8 rRNA genes. The maximum likelihood phylogenetic analysis indicated that D. zhenghuoense was the sister to the rest 11 species of Dendrobium tested.

A Dual-Phase Ceramic Membrane with Extremely High H2 Permeation Flux Prepared by Autoseparation of a Ceramic Precursor.

A novel concept for the preparation of multiphase composite ceramics based on demixing of a single ceramic precursor has been developed and used for the synthesis of a dual-phase H2 -permeable ceramic membrane. The precursor BaCe0.5 Fe0.5 O3-δ decomposes on calcination at 1370 °C for 10 h into two thermodynamically stable oxides with perovskite structures: the cerium-rich oxide BaCe0.85 Fe0.15 O3-δ (BCF8515) and the iron-rich oxide BaCe0.15 Fe0.85 O3-δ (BCF1585), 50 mol % each. In the resulting dual-phase material, the orthorhombic perovskite BCF8515 acts as the main proton conductor and the cubic perovskite BCF1585 as the main electron conductor. The dual-phase membrane shows an extremely high H2 permeation flux of 0.76 mL min(-1)  cm(-2) at 950 °C with 1.0 mm thickness. This auto-demixing concept should be applicable to the synthesis of other ionic-electronic conducting ceramics.