Nanocarbon Chemistry.

Abstract

Carbon is an element that features sp, sp2 and sp3 hybridization, leading to the formation of different carbon allotropes. Diamond and graphite have been well-known carbon materials for centuries. The former is hard and consists of a 3D sp3-hybridized carbon network, while graphite is soft and made of stacked layers of sp2-hybridized carbon atoms. Triggered by the discovery of a soccer-ball shaped buckminsterfullerene (C60) and fullerene-structures (C70, C84) in the early 1980s, carbon nanotubes in the early 1990s, graphene at the beginning of the 2000s, and the recent emergence of various carbon nanoparticles and nanostructures such as diamond nanoparticles, carbon dots, and graphene (quantum) dots, research on carbon nanomaterials has attracted extreme attention in past few years in the communities of material science, chemistry, physics, and engineering. Specifically, the development and utilization of rich carbon chemistry has expanded widely and has furthered the applications of these carbon materials in the fields of biomedicine, energy, catalysts, sensing, environment, engineering, and electronics. This Special Issue of Small presents high quality and interdisciplinary results in the field of nanocarbon chemistry. It is loosely aligned with the symposium held at the 2019 Spring European Material Research Society (E-MRS) Meeting: Symposium M – Advanced Carbon Materials: Electrochemical Aspects, which was held in Nice, France from 27–31 May, 2019. This issue contains 6 Reviews,1-6 11 Communications,7-17 1 Concept18 and 12 Full Papers19-30 from more than 30 different and excellent research groups from all over the world, covering the most recent progress and achievements in chemistry of various nanocarbon films (e.g., graphene, diamond, diamond-like carbon, carbon nanotubes, fullerene, etc.), nanostructures (e.g., graphene/carbon dots, diamond particles, etc.), and composites.1-6 Of special focus, this Special Issue reflects the extraordinarily rapid development in the energy, environmental, catalytic, and biomedicine applications.7-30 It is our honor to serve as the guest editors of this Special Issue. As guest editors, we thank all authors for their great contributions and all the referees for their valuable comments. The guidance and support from the editors and editorial staff of Small throughout the whole process are sincerely appreciated. Although the development and achievements of nanocarbon chemistry is great and exciting, more challenges on nanocarbon chemistry still remain in the synthesis, properties and applications of these carbon nanomaterials. We thus hope that this Special Issue appeals to scientists, researchers and professionals who are interested in nanoscience and nanotechnology of carbon materials. We believe that this Special Issue of Small will benefit to trigger more physical, chemical, biological, medicine, energy, environmental, and electronic studies of various carbon materials, and those beyond. Nianjun Yang obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Fukui (Japan) in 2005. He worked as a postdoctoral researcher at New Mexico State University (USA) and the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (Tsukuba, Japan) from 2006 to 2008. In 2008, he was promoted to group leader at the Fraunhofer Institute of Solid Applied Physics (Freiburg, Germany). Since 2014, he is a senior scientist and group leader at the Institute of Materials Engineering, University of Siegen (Siegen, Germany). His research interests cover the growth of advanced carbon materials such as diamond, graphene, carbon fibers, silicon carbide and their composites, as well as their applications in the fields of sensing, energy storage and conversion, electrocatalysis, environment, and biomedicine. Hua Zhang obtained his B.S. and M.S. degrees at Nanjing University in 1992 and 1995, respectively, and completed his Ph.D. with Prof. Zhongfan Liu at Peking University in 1998. As a Postdoctoral Fellow, he joined Prof. Frans De Schryver's group at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium) in 1999, and then Prof. Chad Mirkin's group at Northwestern University in 2001. After working at NanoInk Inc. (USA) and the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (Singapore), he joined Nanyang Technological University in July 2006. Currently, he is the Herman Hu Chair Professor of Nanomaterials in City University of Hong Kong. His current research focuses on phase engineering of nanomaterials (PENs) and controlled epitaxial growth of heterostructures, including the synthesis of 2D, unusual crystal-phase and amorphous nanomaterials, for applications in catalysis, clean energy, (opto-)electronic devices, nano- and biosensors, and water remediation.