Influence of Temperature on Lithium-Oxygen Battery Behavior

In this Letter we report an electrochemical and morphological study of the response of lithium?oxygen cells cycled at various temperatures, that is, ranging from ?10 to 70 °C. The results show that the electrochemical process of the cells is thermally influenced in an opposite way, that is, by a rate decrease, due to a reduced diffusion of the lithium ions from the electrolyte to the electrode interface, at low temperature and a rate enhancement, due to the decreased electrolyte viscosity and consequent increased oxygen mobility, at high temperature. In addition, we show that the temperature also influences the crystallinity of lithium peroxide, namely of the product formed during cell discharge.This work was supported by the Human Resources Development program (No. 20124010203310) of the Korea Institute of Energy Technology Evaluation and Planning (KETEP) grant funded by the Korea government Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korea government (MEST) (No. 2009-0092780), and by Regione Lazio project, Italy