Coordination agent-dominated phase control of nickel sulfide for high-performance hybrid supercapacitor

Abstract The property of an active material is not only influenced by its morphology and size, but also by its crystal phase. The present phase regulation of nickel sulfide is mainly achieved by controlling the participation of sulfur source in reaction. Thus, new perspectives direct at phase control need to be explored and supplemented. Herein, we proposed a novel coordination agent-dominated phase modulation strategy assisted by a hydrothermal process. It is found that increasing the amount of coordination agent can drove the phase transformation from the initial composite of β-NiS/α-NiS/Ni3S4 to β-NiS/α-NiS, and then to pure β-NiS. The mechanism of phase regulation has been proposed, and the general application of this method has been demonstrated. By employing coordination agent, the size of resulted products is reduced, and the morphology is optimized. As a result, all of the pure β-NiS electrodes indicate significantly enhanced specific capacity than the pristine β-NiS/α-NiS/Ni3S4 composite. Notably, the sample synthesized with 3 mmol of urea (S11) shows uniform morphology and smallest size, and it gives a highest specific capacity of 223.8 mAh g−1 at 1 A g−1, almost 1.5 times of the original sample. The fabricated S11//rGO device delivers a high energy density of 56.6 Wh·kg−1 at a power density of 407.5 W·kg−1, and keeps an impressive capacity retention of 84% after 20,000 cycles. This work put forwards a new prospect for controlling the phase and composition of nickel sulfide based on coordination chemistry.