Electrochemical properties of SnO2 nanorods as anode materials in lithium-ion battery

Well-dispersed SnO2 nanorods with diameter of 4-15 nm and length of 100-200 nm are synthesised through a hydrothermal route and their potential as anode materials in lithium-ion batteries is investigated. The observed initial discharge capacity is as high as 1778 mA·h/g, much higher than the theoretical value of the bulk SnO2 (1494 mA·h/g). During the following 15 cycles, the reversible capacity decreases from 929 to 576 mA·h/g with a fading rate of 3.5% per cycle. The fading mechanism is discussed. Serious capacity fading can be avoided by reducing the cycling voltages from 0.05-3.0 to 0.4-1.2 V. At the end, SnO2 nanorods with much smaller size are synthesized and their performance as anode materials is studied. The size effect on the electrochemical properties is briefly discussed.     

Optoelectronic Characteristics and Field Emission Properties of Indium-Doped Tin Oxide Nanowire Arrays

Optoelectronic characteristics of individual indium-doped tin oxide （In-SnO2） nanowires are investigated by performing transport measurement with UV illumination on/off circles. The current rapidly increases from 0.15 to 55 nA under UV illumination, which is ascribed to the increase of carrier concentration and the decrease of surface depletion. Emcient and stable field emission is obtained from In-Sn02 nanowire arrays. The current density is up to 17mA/cm^2 at 3.4 V/μm, and the fluctuations are less than 1%. The emission behaviour is perfectly in agreement with the Fowler Nordheim theory. Our results imply that In-SnO2 nanowires are promising candidates for UV detectors and field emission displays.     

Low-field electron emission from pinaster-like MoO2 nanoarrays as two-stage emitters

Low-field electron emission is obtained from the pinaster-like MoO2 nanoarrays. The turn-on field of the pinasterlike MoO2 nanoarrays is found to be as low as 2.39 V/μm with the current density of 10μA/cm2. The enhancement factor is extracted to be 3590 from the Fowler-Nordheim plot. These excellent emission properties are attributed to the special structure of the pinaster-like MoO2 nanoarrays and confirmed by the calculation in the frame of the two -stage model. Our results show that the pinaster-like MoO2 nanoarrays are promising candidate in realizing field emission displays.