Electrical characterization of laser-sintered Li3xLa(2/3-x)TiO3 ceramics by impedance spectroscopy

• Grant number: 21/11569-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: December 01, 2021
• End date: November 30, 2023
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Materials and Metallurgical Engineering - Nonmetallic Materials
• Principal Investigator: Lilian Menezes de Jesus
• Grantee: Giovanni Vivi
• Host Institution: Centro de Ciências Exatas e de Tecnologia (CCET). Universidade Federal de São Carlos (UFSCAR). São Carlos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Safety is a major concern for the development of energy storage technologies, especially for lithium-ion batteries, which contain liquid (flammable) organic electrolytes. Replacing these liquid electrolytes with solid-state ionic conductors is of growing interest because of the impact not only on safety but also on increasing storage capacity and life in next-generation batteries. However, achieving an ionic conductivity comparable to that of existing liquid electrolytes (> 1 mS/cm) is challenging. The search for solid lithium-conducting materials, which have high conductivity at low temperatures, is therefore strategic. A material that has been extensively studied in this context is Li3xLa(2/3-x)TiO3, which has a high ionic conductivity at room temperature, reaching up to 1 mS/cm, depending on the value of x and processing conditions. A common problem related to the production of this material is the Li volatilization, which can be reduced by using rapid sintering routes. Recently, it was shown that laser sintering is a potential technique for obtaining Li0.5La0.5TO3 ceramics. However, compositional and microstructural effects that lead to an optimization of ionic conductivity in these ceramics still deserve to be understood. Thus, we propose to study the electrical response of laser-sintered Li3xLa(2/3-x)TiO3 ceramics via impedance spectroscopy. Initially, the simulation of the impedance response of model circuits will be performed using the ZView® software, analyzing the spectra through the various formalisms: impedance, admittance, electrical module, and permittivity. Then, the modeling of the spectra of the ceramics will be performed by adjusting the experimental data to equivalent circuits. (AU)