Graphene, a single layer of carbon atoms bonded in a hexagonal lattice, is the thinnest, strongest, and stiffest known material and an excellent conductor of heat and electricity. However, these superior properties have yet to be realized for graphene-derived macroscopic structures such as graphene fibers. We report the fabrication of graphene fibers with high thermal and electrical conductivity and enhanced mechanical strength. The inner fiber structure consists of large-sized graphene sheets forming a highly ordered arrangement intercalated with small-sized graphene sheets filling the space and microvoids. The graphene fibers exhibit a submicrometer crystallite domain size through high-temperature treatment, achieving an enhanced thermal conductivity up to 1290 watts per meter per kelvin. The tensile strength of the graphene fiber reaches 1080 megapascals.
Flexible graphene paper (GP) pillared by carbon black (CB) nanoparticles using a simple vacuum filtration method is developed as a high-performance electrode material for supercapacitors. Through the introduction of CB nanoparticles as spacers, the self-restacking of graphene sheets during the filtration process is mitigated to a great extent. The pillared GP-based supercapacitors exhibit excellent electrochemical performances and cyclic stabilities compared with GP without the addition of CB nanoparticles. At a scan rate of 10 mV s(-1) , the specific capacitance of the pillared GP is 138 F g(-1) and 83.2 F g(-1) with negligible 3.85% and 4.35% capacitance degradation after 2000 cycles in aqueous and organic electrolytes, respectively. At an extremely fast scan rate of 500 mV s (-1) , the specific capacitance can reach 80 F g(-1) in aqueous electrolyte. No binder is needed for assembling the supercapacitor cells and the pillared GP itself may serve as a current collector due to its intrinsic high electrical conductivity. The pillared GP has great potential in the development of promising flexible and ultralight-weight supercapacitors for electrochemical energy storage.
A nano-scaled coating of titanium oxide (TiO 2 ) on graphene (G) has been achieved via a novel atomic layer deposition (ALD) method. As a potential supercapacitor material, the TiO 2 -G composites exhibited a capacity of 75 F/g and 84 F/g at a scan rate of 10 mV/s for composites grown using 50 and 100 ALD cycles, respectively. The nearly identical Nyquist plots of the TiO 2 -G composites compared with those of pure graphene demonstrated that the composites possess excellent conductivity for charge transfer and open structures for ion diffusion. In addition, even with 3-4 times additional mass loading (maximum 3.22 mg/cm 2 ), the composites exhibit no obvious degradation with respect to the electrochemical performance. This ALD approach presents a promising route to synthesize advanced graphene-based nanocomposites for supercapacitor applications.
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