In recent work [J. Morale
s, J. Santo
s-Pe
xf1;a, Electrochem. Commun. 9 (2007) 2116], we prepared nano
sized
![]()
src="http://www.
sciencedirect.com/
scidirimg/entitie
s/204e.gif" alt="greek
small letter alpha" title="greek
small letter alpha" border="0">-LiFeO<
sub>2
sub> with increa
sed electrochemical activity in lithium cell
s relative to variou
s lithium ferrite polymorph
s. In thi
s work, we
studied the previou
s electrode
s in different charge
state
s in order to obtain a more accurate picture of the phenomena occurring during cycling.
Ex situ X-ray photoelectron
spectro
scopy (XPS) mea
surement
s confirmed the oxidation/reduction of iron atom
s during the charge/di
scharge proce
ss. The electrochemical impedance
spectro
scopy re
sult
s sugge
sted that the electrolyte i
s not oxidi
sed during the fir
st charge, but rather than a
solid electrolyte interface i
s formed after one cycle. Al
so, thermal te
st
s revealed that Fe(IV) pre
sent in the electrode
s reacted with the electrolyte to form oxidi
sed carbon
specie
s. Finally,
![]()
src="http://www.
sciencedirect.com/
scidirimg/entitie
s/204e.gif" alt="greek
small letter alpha" title="greek
small letter alpha" border="0">-LiFeO<
sub>2
sub> wa
s te
sted a
s a po
sitive electrode material in a lithium battery under different regime
s. Stabili
sed capacitie
s up to 150 mAh g<
sup>−1
sup> were obtained under a C/4 regime. Thi
s lithium ferrite i
s therefore an attractive alternative to LiCoO<
sub>2
sub>.