For example, one or two or more materials selected from the group comprising conductive carbon, conductive polymers and metals (conductive material) may include artificial graphite, natural graphite, soft carbon, hard carbon, carbon black, acetylene black, Ketjen black, Denka black, thermal black, channel black, aluminum, tin, bismuth, silicon, antimony, nickel, copper, titanium, vanadium, chromium, manganese, iron, cobalt, zinc, molybdenum, tungsten, silver, gold, lanthanum, ruthenium, platinum, iridium, titanium oxide, zinc oxide, potassium titanate, carbon fluoride, polyaniline, polythiophene, polyacetylene, polypyrrole, a combination thereof, or the like.
The conductive material may have a particle shape (including amorphous shape), a plate shape, a rod shape, a wire shape (fibrous shape), or a mixed shape thereof, of the conductive material described above, and a nanostructure of the conductive material described above may be included together with or instead of the conductive material. The nanostructure may be one or two or more selected from the group comprising nanowire, nanotubes, nanoplates, nanoribbon, nanoparticles, and nanorods. The nanostructure may secure uniform and excellent electrical conductivity in all directions of the active material bulk (and active material film) by the network of the nanostructure.
Here, the conductive material may serve to improve the electrical conductivity of the active material bulk and the active material film, and also serve as a binding agent which binds the active material particles when melting and binding (including partial melting) of the conductive material occur by a heat treatment process for producing a sintered body or a separate energy application process.