LAUSR

Abstract Tin oxide/reduced graphene oxide (SnO2/rGO) composite was extensively used in the area lithium ion batteries, solar cells, sensors and catalysts. High loading of SnO2 was effective for improving the performance, however, which inevitably led to large clusters of SnO2 and the active sites would decrease accordingly. Herein, crumpled SnO2/rGO with concentrated sites was prepared by spray pyrolysis, the density of SnO2 crystals was increased without agglomeration. The ultrafine SnO2 nanocrystals with the size of 3.5 nm interconnected with each other to form an intensive 2D web, which compounded with rGO nanosheets by Sn–O–C covalent bonds, and the SnO2/rGO nanosheets assembled to form a 3D crumpled ball-like structure. The crumpled 2D-in-3D structure and the Sn–O–C bonds endowed the SnO2/rGO with excellent dispersion, good electrical conductivity and structural stability, increased active sites and multilevel mass transfer channels, therefore, SnO2/rGO demonstrated good electrochemical and catalytic performance. The capacity and coulombic efficiency of Sn-1-550 as anode material of lithium battery were 943 mA h g−1 and 94% after 80 cycles, and methyl blue (MB) was catalytic degraded completely by Sn-1-550 in 15 min at room temperature.