Green Approach for Fabrication of Holey Graphene Based Electrode for Supercapacitor Application

Abstract

Holey graphene, also known as perforated graphene is formed generating in-plane holes in basal planes of graphene based materials. By combining the advantages of holes and graphene, holey graphene based materials have attained significant research interest in energy storage systems due to the high surface and high electrical conductivity. In the present work, the holey graphene nanosheets are synthesized using ‘metal catalyst activation strategy’ using a green chemistry approach. The synthesized holey graphene nanosheets are studied in detail using various comprehensive characterization and electrochemical analysis techniques. The green chemistry based fabricated holey graphene nanosheets are directly used as an electrode material in the supercapacitor application. In the supercapacitive study, the fabricated electrode exhibits an efficient performance (high capacitance, rate capacity and stability) than its pristine form (graphene) due to the formation of highly pores morphology which provides stupendous electroactive sites and resistance free pathways for ionic interaction and transport. The presented results provide a new platform for employing green approach for fabricating holey graphene based materials as an electrode in energy storage systems. Keywords: Holey Graphene, Pores, Nanosheets, Green Chemistry, Supercapacitors