The ability to repair damage spontaneously, which is termed self-healing, is an important survival feature in nature because it increases the lifetime of most living creatures. This feature is highly desirable for rechargeable batteries because the lifetime of high-capacity electrodes, such as silicon anodes, is shortened by mechanical fractures generated during the cycling process. Here, inspired by nature, we apply self-healing chemistry to silicon microparticle (SiMP) anodes to overcome their short cycle-life. We show that anodes made from low-cost SiMPs (~3-8 µm), for which stable deep galvanostatic cycling was previously impossible, can now have an excellent cycle life when coated with a self-healing polymer. We attain a cycle life ten times longer than state-of-art anodes made from SiMPs and still retain a high capacity (up to ~3,000 mA h g(-1)). Cracks and damage in the coating during cycling can be healed spontaneously by the randomly branched hydrogen-bonding polymer used.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 204. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 11 August 2026.
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#238,356
of 33,503,639 outputs
Outputs from Nature Chemistry
#69
of 4,042 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#1,780
of 368,215 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Nature Chemistry
#1
of 49 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 33,503,639 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 99th percentile: it's in the top 5% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 4,042 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 33.2. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 98% of its peers.
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We're also able to compare this research output to 49 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 97% of its contemporaries.
