In Situ Reconstruction of Dendrite-Free Zinc Anode with Cu from Reactive Copper Phthalocyanine Interlayer

Aqueous zinc-ion batteries are considered one of the most promising energy storage technologies owing to their low cost, environmental friendliness, and safety, but they are chronically perplexed by Zn dendrites, corrosion, passivation, and more. Herein, a reactive copper phthalocyanine (CuPc) is employed to rebuild a Zn anode with Cu, acting as a physical barrier and interfacial regulator to homogenize the Zn2+ flux for smooth Zn deposition and to restrain Zn corrosion. As a result, CuPc@Zn shows polarization voltages less than 145 mV within 16 mA cm–2 and bears a cumulative areal capacity of 1020 mA h cm–2 at 10 mA cm–2/20 mA h cm–2 and repeated Zn deposition/stripping processes over 1200 h at 1 mA cm–2/1 mA h cm–2. Besides, the cycling stability of the CuPc@Zn anode when pairing with a 9,10-anthraquinone cathode at 50 mA g–1 is greatly improved from 64.8% to ∼100% after 360 cycles, about a 7.2 time increase in the life of a pure Zn-based battery, and the V2O5//CuPc@Zn batteries deliver 155 mA h g–1 (80% of its initial capacity) after 500 cycles at 2 A g–1, also surpassing V2O5//Zn batteries. This work demonstrates the superiority of the reactive organometallic interlayer in guarding the Zn anode and also increases metal anode protection in other batteries.