Electrochemical properties of rutile TiO2 nanorods as anode material for lithium-ion batteries

In this paper, we synthesized rutile TiO2 nanorods by hydrolysis of TiCl4 ethanolic solution in water at 50 A degrees C. Scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy images show that the as-prepared sample was consisted of nanoflowers of about 500 nm in sizes, and each petal of nanoflowers was assembled by several nanorods. We tested the electrochemical properties of the rutile TiO2 nanorods as an anode material for lithium-ion batteries. The rutile TiO2 nanorods exhibited a large initial discharge capacity of 223 mA h g(-1), and the stabilized capacity was as high as 170 mA h g(-1) after 100 cycles. These improved electrochemical performances may be attributed to the shorter diffusion length for both the electron and Li+, and the large electrode-electrolyte contact area offered by the nanorods with a large specific surface area, which facilitated the lithium ions insertion and extraction.