Fabrication of hierarchical flower-shaped cobalt silicate spheres with boosting performance for lithium storage

As a new type of electrode material, transition metal silicates anode has drawn increasing attention owing to high theoretical capacity, sufficient reserves and nontoxicity. Herein, a unique flower-shaped cobalt silicate was fabricated via an alkali-assisted hydrothermal synthesis method, which feathered large specific surface area and abundant meso-pores. Serving as an anode material for lithium ion batteries, the hierarchical CoSiO2 material exhibited excellent cycling stability (1111 mAh g−1 at 0.1 A g−1 after 200 cycles) and superior rate capability (411 mAh g−1 at 10 A g−1). The novel structure of F–CoSiO2 anode not only provided abundant active sites for electrochemical reactions and effectively facilitated the migration of Li ions during charge-discharge process, but also contributed to the primary pseudocapacitive charge storage behaviors. This work may open up opportunities in structure design and represent the enormous potential of hierarchical transition metal silicate as practical advanced electrode for lithium storage.