Designing Soft Solid‐like Viscoelastic Zinc Powder Anode toward High‐Performance Aqueous Zinc‐Ion Batteries

Abstract

Zn powder is considered as a potential Zn metal anode for aqueous Zn‐ion batteries. However, restricted ion/electron transfer and volume effect‐caused electrical contact failure in conventional polymer binder composited Zn powder anodes deteriorate their electrochemical performance. Here, a high‐performance soft solid‐like viscoelastic Zn powder composite anode is proposed based on an oligomer gluing strategy. Benefiting from the viscoelastic properties, the soft‐solid Zn powder composite (ss‐ZnP) anode has significantly enhanced charge transfer, alleviated volume effect, and homogenized interfacial electric field, leading to fast plating/stripping kinetics and dendrite‐free deposition morphology. Furthermore, the assembled NH₄V₄O₁₀‖ss‐ZnP full cell delivers higher capacity (510 mAh g⁻¹ at 0.1A g⁻¹, 300 mAh g⁻¹ at 1A g⁻¹) and longer lifespan up to 500 cycles at 1 A g⁻¹, superior to conventional polymer binder composited Zn powder anode and other reported rheological Zn powder‐based anodes. Apart from the electrochemical merits, this soft matter‐based design also endows the ss‐ZnP electrode with free‐standing and malleable properties which greatly expand its practical application.