Enhancement of high temperature cycling stability in high-nickel cathode materials with titanium doping

Titanium doping is employed to enhance the structural strength of a high-Ni layered cathode material in lithium ion batteries during high temperature cycling. After Ti-doping, the external morphology remains similar, but the lattice parameters of the layered structure are slightly shifted toward larger values. With application of the prepared materials as cathodes in lithium-ion batteries, the initial capacities are similar but the cycling performance at 25 °C is enhanced by Ti-doping. During high temperature cycling at 60 °C, furthermore, highly improved capacity retention is achieved with the Ti-doped material (95% of initial capacity at 50th cycles), while cycle fading is accelerated with the bare electrode. This enhancement is attributed to better retention of the compressive strength of the particles and retarded crack formation within the particles. In addition, impedance increase is reduced in the Ti-doped electrode, which is attributed to an improvement in the structural strength of the high-Ni cathode material with Ti-doping.