Metal-organic framework-based catalysts for lithium-sulfur batteries

Lithium-sulfur batteries (LSBs) have been regarded as one of the most promising successors to lithium-ion batteries owing to their high energy density, low cost and environmental friendliness. However, their practical applications are seriously hindered by the poor overall performance arising from the sluggish sulfur redox kinetics and polysulfide shuttle effect. Over the last few years, introducing catalysts in the cathodic part to accelerate the polysulfide conversion and fundamentally inhibit the shuttle effect has become extensively studied research topics. Various catalytic materials have been employed to boost the whole performance of LSBs. Among them, metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) as a new family of porous coordination polymers have aroused enormous research interest because of their tunable structure, diverse compositions and functional versatility. Herein, recent progress of MOF-based catalysts toward facilitating polysulfide conversion for LSBs is systematically reviewed for the first time. First, the involved redox mechanism and catalysis in LSBs are briefly summarized. Then, pristine MOF, MOF composites and MOF derivatives as catalysts for improving the electrochemical performance are discussed. Ultimately, a short conclusion and the prospect of MOFs-based catalysts for LSBs are presented.