Abstract
In this work, few-layer graphene materials were produced from Fe-lignin nanocomposites through a molecular cracking and welding (MCW) method. MCW process is a low-cost, scalable technique to fabricate few-layer graphene materials. It involves preparing metal (M)-lignin nanocomposites from kraft lignin and a transition metal catalyst, pretreating the M-lignin composites, and forming of the graphene-encapsulated metal structures by catalytic graphitization the M-lignin composites. Then, these graphene-encapsulated metal structures are opened by the molecule cracking reagents. The graphene shells are peeled off the metal core and simultaneously welded and reconstructed to graphene materials under a selected welding reagent. The critical parameters, including heating temperature, heating time, and particle sizes of the Fe-lignin composites, have been explored to understand the graphene formation mechanism and to obtain the optimized process parameters to improve the yield and selectivity of graphene materials.
Highlights
The challenges of sustainable development have driven people to find facile, environmentally friendly ways to produce carbon-based materials
Graphene-Encapsulated Iron Nanoparticles (GEINs) are the main product in the solid residues of catalytically graphitized biomass when iron is used as the transition metal [15]
Carbon atoms will be saturated in the selected metal, and as the temperature drops, carbon becomes supersaturated in the metal
Summary
The challenges of sustainable development have driven people to find facile, environmentally friendly ways to produce carbon-based materials. There have been limited studies on the use of wood or agricultural biomass as the carbon source to produce graphene-based materials. Different processing gases have been used to investigate the production of graphene materials from kraft lignin [14,15]. These gases serve as cracking/welding reagents and are selected from Ar, CH4 , H2 , CO2 , and their mixtures to examine processing gas effects on graphene formation and product component distributions [14]. This work focuses on studying how the process conditions including different heating temperatures, heating time, and GEIN grain particle size (i.e., the particle size of the carbon matrix embedded with GEINs) affect graphene material yield and structure. The optimized process conditions will help to design and operate the scale-up production process
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