Polar mesoporous zinc sulfide nanosheets encapsulated in reduced graphene oxide three-dimensional foams for sulfur host

Lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries exhibit the high specific capacity and energy density, but prevented by the low coulombic efficiency and weak cycle life. Herein, we fabricate reduced graphene oxide (r-GO) three-dimensional (3D) foams encapsulating polar mesoporous zinc sulfide (ZnS) nanosheets and subsequently utilize the ZnS/r-GO foams to load sulfur (ZnS/r-GO/S) as cathodes for improving the performance of Li-S batteries. The mesoporous diameter of the ZnS nanosheets is approximately 10~30 nm and lots of pores in the 3D foams are observed. The porous structure provides abundant sites to adsorb and accommodate sulfur species. The cathode of the ZnS/r-GO/S exhibits 1259 mA h g(−1) of initial capacity and 971.9 mA h g(−1) of the reversible capacity after 200 cycles at 0.1 C (1 C = 1675 mA g(−1)). At 1 C, it still exhibits the tiny capacity decay rate of 0.019% per cycle after 300 cycles. This work may be adopted to combine the nonpolar and polar materials as a 3D network structure for high-performance Li-S batteries.