Synthesis of Porous δ‐MnO₂ Submicron Tubes as Highly Efficient Electrocatalyst for Rechargeable Li–O₂ Batteries

Lithium-oxygen (Li-O2 ) batteries are receiving intense interest because of their high energy density. A new tubular δ-MnO2 material prepared by a simple hydrothermal synthesis is an efficient electrocatalyst for Li-O2 batteries. The synthesized δ-MnO2 exhibits a unique tubular structure, in which the porous walls are composed of highly dispersed ultrathin δ-MnO2 nanosheets. Such a unique structure and its intrinsic catalytic activity provide the right electrocatalyst characteristics for high-performance Li-O2 batteries. As a consequence, suppressed overpotentials-especially the oxygen evolution reaction overpotential-superior rate capability, and desirable cycle life are achieved with these submicron δ-MnO2 tubes as the electrocatalyst. Remarkably, the discharge product Li2 O2 of the Li-O2 battery exhibits a uniform nanosheet-like morphology, which indicates the critical role of the δ-MnO2 in the electrochemical process, and a mechanism is proposed to analyze the catalysis of δ-MnO2 .