Fish-scale-like nano-porous membrane based on zeolite nanosheets for long stable zinc-based flow battery

Zinc-based flow batteries receive widespread attention due to their advantages of low cost and high energy density. However, zinc dendrites are easy to appear during the charge process, pierce the membrane and thus destroy the battery, which seriously restrict its further development. In this article, MFI-type zeolite nanosheets (ns-MFIs) with high mechanical strength and hydrophobicity are in situ introduced to porous polymer membranes, which spontaneously form turnup fish-scale-like structure through the one-step phase inversion/surface segregation process. This special structure well disperses mechanical energy to provide effective protection characteristics to resist the penetration of zinc dendrites, and meanwhile promotes the uniform zinc depositions on the electrode by alleviating the water migration and accelerating zincate ion diffusion, so as to prolong the cycle life of the battery for more than 600 cycles, which is 4 times and 2.5 times longer than the commercial Nafion 212 and pristine porous polymer membrane, respectively. Moreover, the sub-nano size pores and high-aspect-ratio of ns-MFIs afford membranes extra ion sieving ability and transport area for the charging-balancing ions OH⁻ to ensure superior battery performance, delivering an average coulombic efficiency (CE) of ~98.5%, voltage efficiency (VE) of ~83.2%, and energy efficiency (EE) of ~81.9% at 80 mA/cm².