Electrodepositing Textured Sn Film as a Highly Reversible Anode for Aqueous Batteries

Electrodepositing metal materials in large capacity, at low potential, and with high reversibility serves as the foundation for any aqueous rechargeable battery chemistry to realize the promises of high energy, low cost, and high safety. However, such a foundation is not solid because of the natural tendency of metals to form irregular, nonplanar, and often dendritic morphologies during electrochemical crystallization, which is further amplified in an acidic environment due to the faster kinetics of the coupled proton and mass-transport processes between hydrated metal ions and free metal atoms. As a typical representative, tin metal (Sn0) has potential to achieve high energy in acidic batteries, but its nonuniform large-particle morphology, obtained from traditional electrodeposition, leads to dead Sn0 formation and deteriorating reversibility, accompanied by the sustained hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and active Sn0 loss. Here, we report quaternary onium salts as effective interfacial cocations that, via selective adsorption, steadily texturize Sn0 deposition along the (211) plane, which is intrinsically inert to the HER, thus regulating the film deposition process by favoring the formation of planar Sn0 film. Such Sn0 film brings exceptional reversibility in acidic electrolytes, which translates into sustained cycling stability at applicable areal capacities in both anode-half cells (∼1500 deposition/dissolution cycles at 5 mAh cm-2) and full cells (350 charge/discharge cycles at 5 mAh cm-2). Textured electrodeposition with intrinsic HER-suppression capability provides a universal solution for diverse metal anode materials in rechargeable energy-dense aqueous batteries.