Electrospinning Synthesis of Self‐Standing Cobalt/Nanocarbon Hybrid Membrane for Long‐Life Rechargeable Zinc–Air Batteries.

Integrating high‐efficiency oxygen electrocatalyst directly into air electrodes is vital for zinc–air batteries to achieve higher electrochemical performance. Herein, a self‐standing membrane composed of hierarchical cobalt/nanocarbon nanofibers is fabricated by the electrospinning technique. This hybrid membrane can be directly employed as the bifunctional air electrode in zinc–air batteries and can achieve a high peak power density of 304 mW cm−2 with a long service life of 1500 h at 5 mA cm−2. Its assembled solid‐state zinc–air battery also delivers a promising power density of 176 mW cm−2 with decent flexibility. The impressive rechargeable battery performance would be attributed to the self‐standing membrane architecture integrated by oxygen electrocatalysts with abundant cobalt–nitrogen–carbon active species in the hierarchical electrode. This study may provide effective electrospinning solutions in integrating efficient electrocatalyst and electrode for energy storage and conversion technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]