Abstract:
To study the characteristics of nanostructured anode materials of Li batteries, the nanocrystalline Li-Si alloy was prepared. Nanocrystalline Li
7Si
3 alloy was prepared with the optimized processing route including a series of procedures as cast of polycrystalline Li
7Si
3 ingot, ball milling to obtain the amorphous powder and spark plasma sintering to prepare the nanocrystalline Li
7Si
3 bulk. The crystal structure was determined using the Rietveld refinement method and the Young's modulus was measured.Resultsshow that the prepared nanocrystalline Li
7Si
3 has larger lattice constants compared with those of the conventional polycrystalline counterpart, i. e.,
a =
b = 0. 445 2 nm,
c = 1. 823 9 nm, and unit cell volume
Vo= 0. 313 070 nm
3. The unit cell volume is 1. 35% larger than that of the coarse-grained polycrystalline counterpart with a value of
Vo= 0. 308 886 nm
3. The Young's modulus of the nanocrystalline Li
7Si
3 was as (30. 6 ± 2. 4) GPa.