Aligned CNT Forests on Stainless Steel Mesh for Flexible Supercapacitor Electrode with High Capacitance and Power Density

Abstract

Carbon nanotube-based hybrid materials integrated with conducting stainless steel mesh is of great importance for developing electrochemically stable and mechanically flexible supercapacitors. We report sweet spot tunable CVD growth of vertically aligned carbon nanotube coated with TiO2 on stainless steel mesh with remarkable supercapacitor performance. Aligned CNT forest growth is observed at certain distance from the upstream inside the heating zone. We find that residence time of the carbon precursor has significant influence on controlling the density and height of vertically aligned carbon nanotube forest. When the residence time is increased by reducing the carrier gas flow rate from 590 to 300 sccm, vertically aligned carbon nanotube forest height is increased significantly from ∼9 to ∼31 μm on stainless steel mesh. The developed vertically aligned CNT forest on stainless steel mesh found to be suitable for supercapacitor electrode but its superhydrophobic nature limits its energy storage performan...