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Modification of porous carbon with nitrogen elements to enhance the capacitance of supercapacitors

  • Energy materials
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Abstract

A porous carbon precursor is prepared by modifying polyvinylidene fluoride with nitrogen via a chemical polyreaction and then introducing mesopores using the soft-template method. After carbonization at the appropriate temperature, the obtained carbon material could be applied in supercapacitors without further treatment. The resulting material exhibits not only a comparatively stable nitrogen content that is very close to the nitrogen content of its precursor but also an effective hierarchical porous structure (~ 0.68 and ~ 4 nm). The large specific surface area of the carbon material (up to 1688 m2 g−1) is also an important factor influencing its excellent electrochemical performance. When tested using 6 M KOH as an electrolyte in a three-electrode system, CN-900 exhibits a specific capacitance of 355.6 F g−1 at 1 A g−1. When tested using the same electrolyte in a two-electrode system, CN-900 shows a specific capacitance of 84.08 F g−1 at 0.5 A g−1. In addition, the carbon material can maintain 98.4% capacitance after 8000 charge/discharge cycles at a current density of 2 A g−1. The performance of CN-900 is further tested in a two-electrode solid-state supercapacitor with sulfuric acid/polyvinyl alcohol as the electrolyte, and a specific capacitance of 90.31 F g−1 is observed at 1 A g−1. Therefore, the nitrogen-modified porous carbon is a very promising material with practical applications in supercapacitors.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project Numbers 21606151, 21504057 and 21707092), Shanghai Excellent Technology Leaders Program (Project Number 17XD1424900), Shanghai Leading Talent Program (Project Number 017), Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality Project (Project Number 18090503800), Shanghai Natural Science Foundation of Shanghai (Project Numbers 17ZR1441700 and 14ZR1440500), Collaborative Innovation Fund of SIT (Project Number XTCX2015-9), Professor of Special Appointment at Shanghai Institutions of Higher Learning (Eastern Scholar), Shanghai Association for Science and Technology Achievements Transformation Alliance Program (Project Number LM201680). Moreover, I am very grateful to my senior schoolmate, Wei Huanming, for helping and supporting my learning and research all the time. And I specially thank my junior schoolmate, Liu Fengru, to assist me in chemical synthesis experiment about this work.

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  1. School of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Shanghai Institute of Technology, Haiquan Road 100, Shanghai, 201418, People’s Republic of China

    Jing Chen, Bin Chang, Fengru Liu, Huanming Wei, Wei Wei, Hualin Lin & Sheng Han

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  1. Jing Chen
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  2. Bin Chang
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Correspondence to Hualin Lin or Sheng Han.

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Chen, J., Chang, B., Liu, F. et al. Modification of porous carbon with nitrogen elements to enhance the capacitance of supercapacitors. J Mater Sci 54, 11959–11971 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-019-03748-6

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