In‐situ Lithiated SiO₂ as Lithium‐Free Anode for Lithium‐Sulfur Batteries

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Lithium‐sulfur (Li−S) batteries are attractive owing to their high energy density and cost‐effectiveness. However, the practical application of Li−S batteries is hindered by uncontrollable lithium dendrite growth and severe polysulfide shuttling during cycling. Here, we fabricated 100 nm thin SiO 2 decorated on carbon cloth (SiO 2 @CC). It is observed that in‐situ lithiation of SiO 2 forms a highly lithiophilic Li x SiO y layer over SiO 2 which further acts as an efficient host for dendrite‐free lithium metal deposition. So lithiated SiO 2 @CC shows high affinity for homogenous growth of Li while the carbon fibers control the volume change during the deposition/stripping process. Hence, the synergistic effect of Li x SiO y layer and carbon cloth (CC) effectively suppresses dendritic Li growth. As a result, the symmetric cell exhibits an ultra‐stable cycling performance over 1000 h with a low overpotential of <25 mV even at a high current density of 1 mA cm −2 . Further, the lithiated SiO 2 @CC is used as a lithium metal‐free anode (also a flexible electrode) for Li−S battery, which exhibits a stable capacity of 800 mAh g −1 over 500 cycles due to its unique structural properties. This work offers new insights and paves the way for developing dendrite‐free, high‐performance Li−S battery technology.