Wang Anmiao, Cheng Yingwen, Zhang Hongbo, Hou Ye, Wang Yanqin, Liu Jie
J Nanosci Nanotechnol. 2014 Sep;14(9):7015-21. doi: 10.1166/jnn.2014.8960.
Porous carbon is the most widely used electrode materials in energy storage devices. It is generally accepted that in such electrodes, mesoporosity is more desired in supercapacitor than microporosity for the ions tranportation. However, the relatively poor conductivity of porous carbon often leads to low capacitance. To improve the capacity of mesoporous carbon based electrode, we designed a composite film composed of mesoporous carbon, multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) and conducting polymer, Poly-3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene/poly(styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT-PSS), and hoped that each component in the composed film could contribute synergetically to improve electrochemical properties. The electrochemical performance of the film was evaluated by cyclic voltammetry and constant current charge/discharge method. With the assistance of MWNTs and conducting polymer, the specific capacitance of the mesoporous carbon based electrode was amplified six times. The electrode also presented excellent charge/discharge rate and good cycling stability, retaining about 94% of its initial capacitance after 1000 cycles. The results demonstrated that mesoporous carbon is more effectively utilized with assistance of MWNTs and conducting polymer in the electrode. Such method is very promising for the future applications of the porous carbon in electrode materials for high performance electrochemical supercapacitors.
多孔碳是储能装置中使用最广泛的电极材料。人们普遍认为，在这类电极中，对于超级电容器而言，中孔结构比微孔结构更有利于离子传输。然而，多孔碳相对较差的导电性常常导致低电容。为了提高基于中孔碳的电极的容量，我们设计了一种由中孔碳、多壁碳纳米管（MWNTs）和导电聚合物聚3,4 - 乙撑二氧噻吩/聚苯乙烯磺酸盐（PEDOT - PSS）组成的复合薄膜，并希望复合薄膜中的各组分能够协同作用以改善电化学性能。通过循环伏安法和恒流充放电法对该薄膜的电化学性能进行了评估。在MWNTs和导电聚合物的辅助下，基于中孔碳的电极的比电容增大了六倍。该电极还表现出优异的充放电速率和良好的循环稳定性，在1000次循环后仍保留其初始电容的约94%。结果表明，在电极中，借助MWNTs和导电聚合物能更有效地利用中孔碳。这种方法对于多孔碳在高性能电化学超级电容器电极材料中的未来应用非常有前景。
