Scientific Achievement
A combined SAXS/WAXS and Raman spectroscopy are employed to study the global and local solvation structure. This work demonstrates a method for detecting the structure of liquids, which will facilitate the study of structure-performance relationships and the screening of new electrolytes.
Significance and Impact
This work focuses on the microscopic understanding of liquid electrolytes by SAXS/WAXS and Raman. We highlight the unique capabilities of X-ray scattering and Raman for intra- and inter-molecular relationship and nanostructure characterization of electrolytes.
Research Details
- We investigate the saturated LiTFSI dissolved in seven different organic solvents, including PC, THF, ACN, DMF, DME, Diglyme and Tetraglyme.
- It is found that all the saturated electrolytes have a similar feature in SAXS/WAXS plots which possess a charge ordering peak at around 0.7~0.9 Å-1 and a subtle raised tail at low-q part.
- The saturated PC, ACN and THF electrolytes have highly spatial limited TFSI- anions; the glyme-based electrolytes are close to the crystals, while the DMF electrolyte has relatively more freedom for TFSI- anions.
