Modulated Dehydration for Enhanced Anodic Performance of Bacterial Cellulose derived Carbon Nanofibers

Carbon nanofibers (CNF) have shown to improve electrochemical performance when used as anode materials in Lithium‐ion batteries. Bacterial cellulose (BC), which is naturally produced as a hydrogel, yields CNF upon drying followed by pyrolysis. The BC derived CNF, primarily involving freeze‐drying, have been successfully tested as a potential anode material. However, in order to enhance the anodic performance, we need to tune the physiochemical properties of BC. This work is a first of its kind attempt to systematically study the effect of dehydration conditions (namely, oven and freeze drying) of bacterial cellulose hydrogel (produced using two bacterial strains) on the microstructural properties and electrochemical performance of as‐derived CNF. Finally, we demonstrate the use of oven‐dried bacterial cellulose as a sustainable and scalable precursor for CNF with a reversible capacity of 440 mAhg−1 at 0.2 C‐rate with ∼99% coulombic efficiency after 100 continuous charge/discharge cycles