Synthesis and lithium ion storage performance of two-dimensional V4C3 MXene

Two-dimensional MXenes (such as Ti2C, V2C, Nb2C, Ti3C2, and Nb4C3) have shown enormous potential in lithium ion storage, and the exploration of new and/or high- performance MXene-based lithium ion storage materials is an active field. This present work demonstrates the synthesis of two-dimensional vanadium carbide V4C3 MXene by selectively etching Al layers from V4AlC3 in hydrofluoric acid at 55 °C. Large specific surface (∼52.1 m2 g−1) and interlayer spacing (∼0.466 nm) can be obtained in V4C3 MXene via adding sufficient ball-milling treatment on precursor V4AlC3, which is benefit for lithium ion storage. As an anode material for lithium ion batteries, it shows high capacity as well as good rate capability and cycling performance. More specifically, V4C3 delivers a high specific capacity of 225 mAh g−1 after 300 charge/discharge cycles at a current density of 0.1 A g−1, and 125 mAh g−1 at 1 A g−1. This work provides another potential MXene-based lithium ion storage material and is expected to inspire more explorations of high-performance MXene-based electrode materials for lithium ion batteries and capacitors.