Chen Haojie, Yang Chang, Ren Hao, Zhang Weiyi, Cui Xin, Tang Qingquan
State Key Laboratory of New Textile Materials and Advanced Processing Technology, Hubei Key Laboratory for New Textile Materials and Applications, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Wuhan Textile University, Wuhan 430200, China.
State Key Laboratory for Modification of Chemical Fibers and Polymer Materials, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Donghua University, Shanghai 201620, China.
ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2024 Dec 11;16(49):66837-66845. doi: 10.1021/acsami.3c12264. Epub 2023 Nov 9.
Azobenzene (azo)-based solar thermal fuels (STFs) have been developed to harvest and store solar energy. However, due to the lipophilicity and low energy density of azo-based STFs, the derived devices demand a large amount of toxic organic solvents for continuous and scalable energy storage. Herein, we report an ionic strategy to prepare water-soluble azo-based STFs (WASTFs) with improved energy storage performance, which can be realized through a facile quaternization reaction using commercial reagents. A family of WASTFs were synthesized, and all of them showed good water solubility, long-term thermal half-life (>30 days), and high energy storage density (a highest energy density of ∼143.6 J g corresponding to an energy storage enthalpy of ∼111.8 kJ mol). Compared to the electrically neutral azo-based STFs with similar chemical structures, Δ and thermal half-life (τ) of the WASTFs are 2.5 times higher and 7.3 times longer, respectively. Cation-π interactions between the quaternized moieties [N(CH)] and benzene moieties of azo were confirmed, which could account for their improvement of the energy storage performance. Macroscale heat release with an average temperature difference of ∼2 °C was achieved for the WASTFs prepared in this work. Generally, a novel family of WASTFs are synthesized and show great applicable prospects in fabricating advanced solar energy storage devices.
基于偶氮苯的太阳能热燃料（STF）已被开发用于收集和储存太阳能。然而，由于基于偶氮苯的STF具有亲脂性和低能量密度，衍生出的器件需要大量有毒有机溶剂来实现连续且可扩展的能量存储。在此，我们报告一种离子策略，用于制备具有改善储能性能的水溶性偶氮苯基STF（WASTF），这可通过使用商业试剂进行简便的季铵化反应来实现。合成了一系列WASTF，它们均表现出良好的水溶性、长期热半衰期（>30天）和高储能密度（最高能量密度约为143.6 J g，对应储能焓约为111.8 kJ mol）。与具有相似化学结构的电中性偶氮苯基STF相比，WASTF的Δ和热半衰期（τ）分别高出2.5倍和长7.3倍。证实了季铵化部分[N(CH)]与偶氮苯的苯环部分之间存在阳离子-π相互作用，这可以解释它们储能性能的提高。对于本工作制备的WASTF，实现了平均温差约为2°C的宏观热释放。总体而言，合成了一类新型WASTF，并在制造先进太阳能存储器件方面显示出巨大的应用前景。
