Highly Porous FeS/Carbon Fibers Derived from Fe-Carrageenan Biomass: High-capacity and Durable Anodes for Sodium-Ion Batteries

The nanostructured metal sulfides have been reported as promising anode materials for sodium-ion batteries (SIBs) due to their high theoretical capacities but have suffered from the unsatisfactory electronic conductivity and poor structural stability during a charge/discharge process, thus limiting their applications. Herein, the one-dimensional (1D) porous FeS/carbon fibers (FeS/CFs) micro/nanostructures are fabricated through facile pyrolysis of double-helix-structured Fe-carrageenan fibers. The FeS nanoparticles are in situ formed by interacting with sulfur-containing group of natural material ι-carrageenan and uniformly embedded in the unique 1D porous carbon fibrous matrix, significantly enhancing the sodium-ion storage performance. The obtained FeS/CFs with optimized sodium storage performance benefits from the appropriate carbon content (20.9 wt %). The composite exhibits high capacity and excellent cycling stability (283 mAh g-1 at current density of 1 A g-1 after 400 cycles) and rate performance (247 mAh g-1 at 5 A g-1). This work provides a simple strategy to construct 1D porous FeS/CFs micro/nanostructures as high-performance anode materials for SIBs via a unique sustainable and environmentally friendly way.