Kirigami-inspired synthesis of functional mesoporous nanospheres through spray drying of holey nanosheets

Abstract

Mesoporous graphene and other carbon derivative nanospheres have attracted intensive research attention owing to their many unique characteristics and fascinating properties. However, facile synthesis of these mesoporous nanospheres with a small particle size and controllable morphology is still a grand challenge. Herein, we report a Kirigami-inspired approach to prepare mesoporous spherical graphene oxide (MSGO) particles through spray drying of holey GO sheets. By increasing pore size and porosity of the holey GO sheets, the spray-dried particles underwent the transition from rough crumpled structure to smooth spherical shape. The prepared MSGO particles have tunable diameters smaller than 200 nm and a high specific surface area of 503 m2/g, which enable consistent high-efficiency physical adsorption removal of organic dyes such as Rhodamine B from polluted water with a high adsorption rate of 335.6 mg/(g min). Moreover, the reported synthetic route provides the freedom to easily incorporate other functional nanoparticles such as TiO2, CuO or post-dope MSGO with nitrogen elements for construction of multifunctional composite particles with tailorable structures, which may enable a broad range of promising applications.