Peanut shaped MnCo₂O₄ winded by multi-walled carbon nanotubes as an efficient cathode catalyst for Li-O₂ batteries

Rechargeable Li-O₂ batteries have great potential on achieving large-capacity electrochemical energy storage. However, the poor cyclic stability seriously limits its commercial application. In this paper, peanut shaped MnCo₂O₄ which winding by multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MCO/MWCNTs) were synthesized through a facile solvothermal method. As-prepared MCO/MWCNTs have a unique hierarchical mesoporous of three-level pore sizes and show good ORR and OER electrocatalytic activity. When MCO/MWCNTs served as cathode catalysts in Li-O₂ batteries, the batteries exhibited long cycle life of 120 times at 100 mA g⁻¹ with a limited capacity of 500 mAh g⁻¹ and high discharge capacity up to 8849 mAh g⁻¹ with a restrict voltage of 2 V at 100 mA g⁻¹.