Supercapacitor Electrodes with Remarkable Specific Capacitance Converted from Hybrid Graphene Oxide/NaCl/Urea Films.

A novel approach to improve the specific capacitance of reduced graphene oxide (rGO) films is reported. We combine the aqueous dispersion of liquid-crystalline GO incorporating salt and urea with a blade-coating technique to make hybrid films. After drying, stacked GO sheets mediated by solidified NaCl and urea are hydrothermally reduced, resulting in a nanoporous film consisting of rumpled N-doped rGO sheets. As a supercapacitor electrode, the film exhibits a high gravimetric specific capacitance of 425 F g and a record volumetric specific capacitance of 693 F cm at 1 A g in 1 M HSO aqueous electrolyte when integrated into a symmetric cell. When using LiSO aqueous electrolyte, which can extend the potential window to 1.6 V, the device exhibits high energy densities up to 35 Wh kg, and high power densities up to 10 W kg. This novel strategy to intercalate solidified chemicals into stacked GO sheets to functionalize them and prevent them from restacking provides a promising route toward supercapacitors with high specific capacitance and energy density.