Nickel oxide-modified nickel foam current collectors for uniform lithium deposition at the anode

Lithium metal anodes, possessing a high theoretical specific capacity of 3860 mAh g⁻¹ and a low potential (−3.04 V vs. the standard hydrogen electrode), represent a promising direction for advanced energy-storage technology. Nevertheless, the uncontrolled dendritic growth of lithium metal, resulting in poor reversibility and substantial volume changes, significantly impedes the practical implementation of lithium metal batteries. This study introduces nickel oxide nanoparticles as lithiophilic sites on the 3D skeleton of nickel foam (NF) as a 3D current collector (NF-NiO) to promote dendrite-free Li deposition. The NiO nanoparticles effectively modulated Li–metal deposition morphology, reducing the formation of multiple interfacial layers that could cause phase separation and high electrochemical polarization. The nickel foam annealed at 450 °C (NF-NiO450) as a current collector achieved an average Li–metal plating/stripping Coulombic efficiency (CE) of 97.7% for 330 cycles, significantly outperforming neat NF (∼96.6%), which lasted only 75 cycles. The LiFePO₄‖NF-NiO450 (prelithitated to a negative-to-positive areal capacity ratio, N/P ratio ≈ 1.51) cell demonstrated superior rate capability and maintained 92.42% capacity retention over 160 cycles. This engineered 3D current collector design advances the development of high-energy, long-life lithium metal batteries.