A new synthetic approach of nano-sized polyaniline cathode material for zinc-polyaniline rechargeable battery

Abstract

The electrochemical performances of electrochemically synthesized polyanilinenano (nPANI) material as cathode vs. zinc metal as anode is investigated.The nPANI particle is synthesized by galvanostatic electro-oxidation of aniline from interfacial solution on metal electrode surface and characterized by UV-Visible, FTIR, powder XRD and TEM. The material is crystalline nano spheres with meso pores among them, uniformly distributed and dispersed. The sizes of the particles lie in 50-100 nm region. This nPANI is used as cathode material in Zn│(NH4)2SO4, ZnSO4(aq)│nPANI battery and its electrochemical performances is investigated by galvanostatic charge-discharge cycling. The electrochemical cell exhibits an open circuit potential of 1.3 volts and a discharge plateau with an average discharge potential of 1.1 volts. The maximum discharge capacity observed is 250 Ah.Kg-1