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Polypyrrole (PPy) hollow micro/nanospheres have been widely designed to encapsulate active sulfur as cathodes in lithium−sulfur (Li−S) batteries to inhibit the polysulfide shuttle effect. Here, for the first time, well-defined hierarchically porous double-shell hollow polypyrrole@sulfur (h-PPy@S) microspheres were fabricated as sulfur cathodes for high-performance Li−S batteries, with sulfonated polystyrene (PSS) microspheres as sacrificial templates. With an optimized outer sulfur shell, the hierarchically porous h-PPy@S cathode possessed superior electrochemical performance, in comparison with the reported S@PPy cathodes with outer PPy shells, especially the cycling stability. The superior electrochemical performance should have resulted from the unique hierarchically porous double-shell hollow nanostructure with an inner PPy shell and a thinner uniform outer S shell.

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A versatile approach was developed for the preparation of cross-linked attapulgite (ATP)-nitrile butadiene rubber (NBR) nanocomposites or NBR grafted ATP nanorods, by facilely adjusting the feeding ratio between the butadiene-based rubbers and the thiol-modified attapulgite (ATP-SH) nanorods in a facile thermal-triggered thiol–ene interfacial click reaction. The modified products with different feeding ratios between the ATP-SH and NBR were characterized with FT-IR, TGA, and TEM techniques. The results indicated that the cross-linked ATP-NBR nanocomposites could be produced via the thiol–ene interfacial click reaction with excess NBR, while the NBR grafted ATP nanorods could be synthesized via the reaction with excess ATP-SH nanorods. Based on the results, a possible mechanism and potential applications were proposed.

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