Highly porous structure strategy to improve the SnO2 electrode performance for lithium-ion batteries

SnO2 is a promising high-capacity anode material for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs), but it usually exhibits poor cycling stability due to its huge volume variation during the lithium uptake and release process. In this work, SnO2 nanofibers and nanotubes with highly porous (HPNFs, HPNTs) structure have been synthesized by a facile emulsion electrospinning and subsequent calcination process in air at 500 °C. Pores with a diameter range of 2–30 nm were distributed evenly on the surface of the nanofibers and nanotubes. The HPNFs and HPNTs manifested high capacities and excellent cycle performance as the anode electrode for LIBs, and they can deliver reversible capacities of 583 and 645 mA h g−1 at a current density of 100 mA g−1 after 50 cycles, respectively. When the current density is up to 5 A g−1, the electrodes still exhibit a good retention, and the reversible capacities were about 370 and 432 mA h g−1, which performs much better than the nanofibers and nanotubes without a porous structure. Our results demonstrated that this simple method could be extended for the synthesis of porous metal oxide nanotubes with high performances in the applications of lithium ion batteries and other fields.