The use of solid-state electrolytes (SSEs) within batteries is a promising strategy to safely access the high capacity of lithium metal anodes. However, most SSEs with practical ionic conductivity are chemically unstable in contact with lithium metal, which is detrimental to battery performance. Lithium aluminum germanium phosphate (LAGP) is an SSE with high ionic conductivity (10⁻⁴-10⁻³ S cm⁻¹) and good environmental stability, but it forms an amorphous interphase region that continuously grows in contact with Li, leading to chemo-mechanical failure within solid-state batteries. Here, we find that thin (∼30 nm) chromium interlayers deposited between the lithium electrode and LAGP extend cycle life to over 1000 h at moderate current densities (0.1–0.2 mA cm⁻²), compared to ∼30 h without protection. This significantly improved stability occurs because the metallic interlayer alters the trajectory of interphase formation and the nature of the electrochemical reaction at the interface. This work shows the promise of interface engineering for a variety of SSE materials within solid-state batteries, while emphasizing the necessity of understanding how protection layers affect dynamic evolution of interfaces.

The construction and performance of a second generation of super dielectric material based electrostatic capacitors (EC), with energy density greater than 200 J·cm⁻³, which rival the best reported energy density of electric double layer capacitors (EDLC), also known as supercapacitors, are reported. The first generation super dielectric materials (SDM) are multi-material mixtures with dielectric constants greater than 1.0 × 10⁵, composed of a porous, electrically insulating powder filled with a polarizable, ion-containing liquid. Second-generation SDMs (TSDM), introduced here, are anodic titania nanotube arrays filled with concentrated aqueous salt solutions. Capacitors using TiO₂ based TSDM were found to have dielectric constants at ~0 Hz greater than 10⁷ in all cases, a maximum operating voltage of greater than 2 volts and remarkable energy density that surpasses the highest previously reported for EC capacitors by approximately one order of magnitude. A simple model based on the classic ponderable media model was shown to be largely consistent with data from nine EC type capacitors employing TSDM.