Hierarchical Composite of Sb₂S₃ decorated on highly crumpled Ti₃C₂T_x nanosheets for enhanced sodium storage properties

Hierarchical composites with good electrical conductivity and sufficient voids are in great demand for the high-performance storage of sodium ions but typically limited due to the complicated synthesis procedure. Here, we report on a facile wet-chemistry synthesis of Sb₂S₃ nanoparticles onto highly crumpled Ti₃C₂T_x nanosheets, which form three-dimensional (3D) architecture with good electrical conductivity. The homogeneously distributed Sb₂S₃ nanoparticles suppress the restacking issue of the Ti₃C₂T_x nanosheets, which creates rich voids for rapid electron/Na⁺ transport and minimizes the volume expansion effect from Sb₂S₃ upon repeated charging/discharging cycles. When used as a sodium-ion battery (SIB) anode, the composite shows a high capacity (329 mAh g⁻¹ at 100 mA g⁻¹ after 100 cycles) and good rate capability and cycling performance (215 mAh g⁻¹ at 2 A g⁻¹ and maintains 118 mAh g ⁻¹ after 500 cycles). We believe the metallic interconnected network and the 3D architecture synergistically result in a promoted sodium-ion storage performance. This work provides a simple strategy to construct MXene-based hybrids with a porous network structure for application fields, such as energy storage, photocatalysis, adsorption, and microwave absorption.