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While stretchable micro‐supercapacitors (MSCs) have been realized, they have suffered from limited areal electrochemical performance, thus greatly restricting their practical electronic application. Herein, a facile strategy of 3D printing and unidirectional freezing of a pseudoplastic nanocomposite gel composed of Ti3C2Tx MXene nanosheets, manganese dioxide nanowire, silver nanowires, and fullerene to construct intrinsically stretchable MSCs with thick and honeycomb‐like porous interdigitated electrodes is introduced. The unique architecture utilizes thick electrodes and a 3D porous conductive scaffold in conjunction with interacting material properties to achieve higher loading of active materials, larger interfacial area, and faster ion transport for significantly improved areal energy and power density. Moreover, the oriented cellular scaffold with fullerene‐induced slippage cell wall structure prompts the printed electrode to withstand large deformations without breaking or exhibiting obvious performance degradation. When imbued with a polymer gel electrolyte, the 3D‐printed MSC achieves an unprecedented areal capacitance of 216.2 mF cm−2 at a scan rate of 10 mV s−1, and remains stable when stretched up to 50% and after 1000 stretch/release cycles. This intrinsically stretchable MSC also exhibits high rate capability and outstanding areal energy density of 19.2 µWh cm−2 and power density of 58.3 mW cm−2, outperforming all reported stretchable MSCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords: 3D printing; MXene; stretchable micro-supercapacitor; thick electrode; wearable electronics EN 3D printing MXene stretchable micro-supercapacitor thick electrode wearable electronics 1 1 1 04/16/20 20200414 NES 200414 In article number 1903794, Jiajie Liang and co-workers present a strategy for the 3D-printing and unidirectional freezing of a nanocomposite gel composed of MXene, MnO SB 2 sb nanowires (NWs), AgNWs, and C60 to construct intrinsically stretchable micro-supercapacitors (MSCs) with thick and honeycomb-like porous interdigitated electrodes. The 3D-printed MSC exhibits high areal capacitance of 216.2 mF cm SP -2 sp at 10 mV s SP -1 sp , and remains stable when stretched up to 50%. 3D printing, MXene, stretchable micro-supercapacitor, thick electrode, wearable electronics. [Extracted from the article]

• 3D porous and highly conductive thick electrodes were designed by 3D printing. • 3D-printed thick electrodes were constructed by using nanocomponents-based hybrid ink. • 3D-printed electrodes show both high areal capacity and rate performance. • This strategy represents a simple process for the preparation of thick electrodes. The development of robust performing lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) with high areal capacity is a challenge that persists to date. One commonly used strategy to increase areal capacity is increasing the thickness of the battery electrodes. However, the practical application of these thick electrodes is hindered thanks to the fundamental issues of incomplete electrolyte infiltration, poor mechanical properties, and slow charge and ion transport. Herein, a new method is presented wherein a thick electrode is constructed by 3D printing a highly-conductive and hierarchical network of silver nanowires (AgNWs), graphene and Li 4 Ti 5 O 12 together as a mixed functional ink. The amalgamation of highly conductive AgNW network, interconnected 3D graphene scaffold, and hierarchical porous structure can allow the 3D-printed electrode to demonstrate much improved charge and ion transport, and to alleviate internal stresses during the charging and discharging process even under ultrahigh thickness state. As a result, the LIBs utilizing these thick electrodes have a rate capability of 121 mAh g−1 at 10C, high areal capacities up to 4.74 mAh cm−2, and stable cycling performance (capacity retention of ~95.5% after 100 cycles). These performance metrics provide a route for a new design strategy using thick electrodes for high-performance energy storage devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]