Hierarchical SnO2 hollow nanotubes as anodes for high performance lithium-ion battery

Nanostructured transition metal oxides are promising anode materials for lithium-ion batteries. Nevertheless, the problem of high volume expansion rate limits its further application. In this paper, we present a 3D hierarchical SnO2 hollow nanotubes material by calcining C@SnS2 materials in the air. This structure combines the advantages of both the hollow nanotubes and the outer staggered nanosheets structure, in which the hollow nanotube can provide more lithium ion transport channels, the space between the tubes can buffer the volume change, and the staggering nanosheets structure can effectively improve the relative specific surface area of the material and improve the storage capacity. As a result, the SnO2 hollow nanotubes anode exhibits the highly reversible capacity of 1079 mAh g−1 at a current density of 100 mA g−1, while the reversible specific capacity of 770 mAh g−1 was obtained after 100 cycles. The research results obtained in this work provide a feasible strategy for synthetic nanoscale transition metal oxide as high-performance lithium anode material.