Mixed-valent VOx/polymer nanohybrid fibers for flexible energy storage materials

A large-scale production process composed of the novel Forcespinning (R) technology followed by relatively low-temperature calcination (450 degrees C) was developed in this report for a flexible/bendable energy storage material of heterogeneous vanadium oxide/polyvinylpyrrolidone derivative nanofibers with bark-like topography. It overcomes the low fabrication-efficiency and cost-performance shortcomings of previous techniques, such as tedious synthesis and high carbonization/growth temperature. The mechanical flexibility from moderately cross-linked polymeric backbones and the mixed valence-induced high electronic conductivity (4.48 x 10(4) S m(-1)) from vanadium oxide concurrently endow these nanohybrid fibers as high performance flexible electrode materials for lithium-ion batteries. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd and Techna Group S.r.l. All rights reserved.