Digital-Twin-Assisted Insights into Irreversible Capacity and Activation Strategy Power High-Loading Solid-State Batteries.

In solid-state lithium-ion batteries (SSLIBs), the fraction of active materials involved in electrode electrochemistry reduces with the increase of electrode thickness. Conventional wisdom suggests that the degree of reaction linearly decreases toward the current-collector as that in the lithium-ion batteries, which is, however, limited by the high difficulty of experimental capture of operando transport of charge & mass. Electrode dynamics simulations can provide space visualization but are usually based on assumed or simplified models. Herein, we build digital-twin electrodes with digital-space voxel microstructure based on synchrotron tomography, which transforms the electrode architecture from real space to digital space for the construction of precision models. From the digital-model-driven simulation, we find an interesting "lithium trapping" effect, stemming from susceptible lithium stuck in the solid electrolyte, triggers an inadequate reaction of the intermediate region of electrodes but not near current-collector region. Then, we construct locally accelerated ion paths activating the lithium trapping, indicating that this strategy can significantly guide the sustainable battery design for next-generation energy storage.