"Dissolution-Capture" Strategy to Form Monodispersed Nitrogen-Doped Hollow Mesoporous Carbon Spheres. Issue 14 (1st January 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Chen, Aibing; Xia, Kechan; Yu, Yifeng; Sun, Hexu; Liu, Lei; Ren, Shaofeng; Li, Yuetong
• Is Part Of: Journal of the Electrochemical Society. Volume 163:Issue 14(2016)
• Page Start: A3063
• Page End: A3068
• Publication Date: 2016-01-01
• Subjects: supercapacitors; Electrochemistry -- Periodicals; 541.3705
• DOI: 10.1149/2.1021614jes
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0013-4651

Abstract

Abstract : Monodispersed nitrogen-doped hollow mesoporous carbon spheres (N-HMCSs) have been successfully synthesized using a novel "dissolution-capture" method. The mesoporous silica is uniformly coated on the surface of the polystyrene/polyacrylonitrile composite nanospheres (PS@PAN) core by using a modified Stöber method. Then a hollow cavity is formed through the dissolution of the PS@PAN in organic solvent. The dissolved PS@PAN as the carbon and nitrogen precursor is captured in the mesochannels of the silica shell. The obtained N-HMCSs have high specific surface area of 807 m 2 g −1, uniform mesopore size of 4.1 nm, and nitrogen content of 3.6 at.%. In addition, the N-HMCSs show a high specific capacitance of 212 F g −1 at a current density of 1 A g −1 in 6 M KOH electrolyte and capacitance retention of 93.9% after 10000 charge/discharge cycles at 5 A g −1 . The "dissolution-capture" method can give a useful enlightenment for the design of electrode materials for supercapacitors.