Oxygen-defective MnO2 decorated carbon nanotube as an effective sulfur host for high performance lithium sulfur battery.

[Display omitted] • The carbon nanotube/oxygen-defective MnO 2 composite was designed as an effective sulfur host material. • The continuous carbon nanotube skeleton facilitates electron transport. • The oxygen-defective MnO 2 exhibits successful lithium polysulfides adsorption and catalysis process. • The resulting sulfur cathode delivers stable cyclic performance. The incorporation of sulfur with multifunctional conductive host material has been regarded as a promising strategy to improve the sulfur utilization and mitigate the polysulfides diffusion for high-performance Li-S battery. Herein, an oxygen-defective MnO 2 nanoparticles modified carbon nanotube composite (CNT/OD-MnO 2) has been proposed as multifunctional sulfur host materials. In the CNT/OD-MnO 2 , the continuous CNT frameworks provide abundant conduction paths of electrons, and the oxygen-defective MnO 2 nanoparticles can accelerate the adsorption and conversion process of polysulfides during the charge–discharge process. As expected, the derived sulfur cathode exhibits superior electrochemical properties with the assistance of CNT/OD-MnO 2. Compared with the CNT/MnO 2 -S (61.8%) and CNT-S (38.8%) cathodes, the CNT/OD-MnO 2 -S cathode delivers a higher capacity retention of 81.3% even after 300 cycles. These results confirm the promising application of CNT/OD-MnO 2 as an effective sulfur host material for advanced Li-S battery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]