Facile fabrication of CuO mesoporous nanosheet cluster array electrodes with super lithium-storage properties

A facile and low-cost approach has been developed to fabricate CuO mesoporous nanosheet cluster arrays (MNCAs) directly grown on a Cu substrate via an ammonia vapor-phase corrosion route. As integrated anodes for lithium-ion batteries without binders and conductivity agents, CuO MNCAs exhibit a high reversible capacity of 639.8 mA h g−1 after 100 cycles at 1C rate and a high-rate capability of 548.8 mA h g−1 at 10C rate. Excellent lithium-storage properties may be ascribed to the unique MNCA structure, which offers a large surface to volume ratio that favors lithium-storage, and provides a large free space to alleviate the large volume variation during the charge–discharge process. The strategy of vapor-phase corrosion is promising for use in the construction other nanoarchitectured materials for high power applications.