The present invention provides: a fibrous carbon characterized in that the average effective fiber length is 1-100 μm, and the crystallite length (La) measured using X-ray diffraction is 100-500 nm; an electrode mixture layer for a non-aqueous-electrolyte secondary cell, said mixture comprising an electrode active material and a carbon-based electroconductive auxiliary agent containing said fibrous carbon; an electrode for a non-aqueous-electrolyte secondary cell, the electrode comprising a collector and said electrode mixture layer for a non-aqueous-electrolyte secondary cell, the electrode mixture layer being laminated on the collector; and a non-aqueous-electrolyte secondary cell having said electrode for a non-aqueous-electrolyte secondary cell.

Cathodes are provided, wherein at least one of the cathode's active material, binder, or graphite are in the form of carbon-coated particles. Alternatively, rings of the cathode, or the cathode itself, may be coated with carbon. The coating may be as thin as a single layer of carbon. Electrochemical cells comprising such cathodes are also provided. Methods of preparing such cathodes and electrochemical cells are also provided.

Technologies and techniques for the dry manufacture of an electrode. A substrate is provided, and a primer material is dispensed on the substrate to provide a primer layer on the substrate, dispensing an electrode material on the primer layer and attaching the electrode material via pressure and/or temperature to provide an electrode material layer.

A positive electrode used in a secondary cell that is an example of the present embodiment is provided with a positive electrode collector, an intermediate layer formed on the positive electrode collector, and a positive electrode mixture layer formed on the intermediate layer. The positive electrode mixture layer has a thermally expandable material and a positive electrode active material. The thermally expandable material content of the positive electrode mixture layer is at least 0.1% by mass and less than 5% by mass. The intermediate layer has an insulating inorganic material and a conductive agent. The insulating inorganic material content of the intermediate layer is 80-99% by mass.

A lithium-sulfur battery cathode including conductive porous carbon particles vacuum infused with sulfur and a conductive collector substrate to which the sulfur infused porous carbon particles are deposited. The sulfur infused carbon particles are encapsulated by an encapsulation polymer, the encapsulation polymer having ionic conductivity, electronic conductivity, polysulfide affinity, or combinations thereof. A lithium-sulfur battery including the lithium-sulfur battery cathode, a lithium anode and an electrolyte disposed between the sulfur cathode and the lithium anode is also provided. Methods of producing the sulfur cathode for use in a lithium-sulfur battery by a hybrid vacuum-and-melt method are also provided.

A negative electrode for a lithium metal battery, a manufacturing method thereof, and a lithium battery including the same. An adhesive layer including a binder and a conductive material between the negative current collector and the negative active material improves conductivity while also improving adherence between a negative current collector and a negative active material of the lithium battery.

The present invention is a technology for replacing a lithium ion secondary battery using an inorganic material, which is currently commercially available, and is a technology for constructing a secondary battery using an organic material as an electrode material. The organic electrode has a disadvantage in that the actual energy density is low because it has to include a large amount of carbon-based conductor in the electrode due to poor electrical conductivity. In order to overcome this drawback, in the present invention, the loading amount of the organic active material in the electrode is increased by filling the pores of the carbon structure body, such as porous activated carbon, with an organic electrode material and coating the outside of the carbon structure body with an organic electrode material. In addition, by using a carbon material current collector instead of the conventional metal current collector such as Al or Cu, a flexible and binder-free organic electrode was fabricated to increase the loading amount, reduce the weight of the battery, and improve the electrochemical properties.

Provided is a multivalent metal-ion battery comprising an anode, a cathode, a porous separator electronically separating the anode and the cathode, and an electrolyte in ionic contact with the anode and the cathode to support reversible deposition and dissolution of a multivalent metal, selected from Ni, Zn, Be, Mg, Ca, Ba, La, Ti, Ta, Zr, Nb, Mn, V, Co, Fe, Cd, Cr, Ga, In, or a combination thereof, at the anode, wherein the anode contains the multivalent metal or its alloy as an anode active material and the cathode comprises a cathode layer of an exfoliated graphite or carbon material recompressed to form an active layer that is oriented in such a manner that the active layer has a graphite edge plane in direct contact with the electrolyte and facing or contacting the separator.

A nanocomposite includes one or more graphene-based materials (GMs), a nitrogen-containing polymer (an N-polymer), and elemental sulfur (S). The nanocomposite is suitable for use as a stable, high capacity electrode for rechargeable batteries such as lithium-sulfur (Li—S) batteries. Example methods of fabricating a nanocomposite include the addition of an N-polymer to a dispersion (e.g., an aqueous dispersion) or slurry of GMs mixed with a sulfur sol. The N-polymer can interact strongly with the GMs to form a cross-linked network. In one embodiment, hydrothermal treatment of the aqueous dispersion or slurry is used to melt the sulfur such that it becomes distributed within the network formed by the GMs and the N-polymer. The resulting nanocomposite material can then be processed through the addition of one or more other binders and/or solvents, and formed into a final electrode.

A graphene foam-protected selenium cathode layer for an alkali metal-selenium cell, comprising: (a) a sheet or a roll of solid graphene foam composed of multiple pores and pore walls containing graphene sheets, wherein the graphene sheets contain a pristine graphene material having less than 0.01% by weight of non-carbon elements or a non-pristine graphene material having 0.01% to 20% by weight of non-carbon elements, wherein said non-pristine graphene is selected from graphene oxide, reduced graphene oxide, graphene fluoride, graphene chloride, graphene bromide, graphene iodide, hydrogenated graphene, nitrogenated graphene, boron-doped graphene, nitrogen-doped graphene, chemically functionalized graphene, or a combination thereof, wherein the graphene sheets are interconnected or chemically merged together without an adhesive resin; and (b) selenium coating or particles residing in the pores or bonded to the pore walls of the solid graphene foam.