Nanowire modified carbon fibers for enhanced electrical energy storage

Abstract

The study of electrochemical super-capacitors has become one of the most attractive topics in both academia and industry as energy storage devices because of their high power density, long life cycles, and high charge/discharge efficiency. Recently, there has been increasing interest in the development of multifunctional structural energy storage devices such as structural super-capacitors for applications in aerospace, automobiles, and portable electronics. These multifunctional structural super-capacitors provide structures combining energy storage and load bearing functionalities, leading to material systems with reduced volume and/or weight. Due to their superior materials properties, carbon fiber composites have been widely used in structural applications for aerospace and automotive industries. Besides, carbon fiber has good electrical conductivity which will provide lower equivalent series resistance; therefore, it can be an excellent candidate for structural energy storage applications. Hence, this paper is focused on performing a pilot study for using nanowire/carbon fiber hybrids as building materials for structural energy storage materials; aiming at enhancing the charge/discharge rate and energy density. This hybrid material combines the high specific surface area of carbon fiber and pseudo-capacitive effect of metal oxide nanowires, which were grown hydrothermally in an aligned fashion on carbon fibers. The aligned nanowire array could provide a higher specific surface area that leads to high electrode-electrolyte contact area thus fast ion diffusion rates. Scanning Electron Microscopy and X-Ray Diffraction measurements are used for the initial characterization of this nanowire/carbon fiber hybrid material system. Electrochemical testing is performed using a potentio-galvanostat. The results show that gold sputtered nanowire carbon fiber hybrid provides 65.9% higher energy density than bare carbon fiber cloth as super-capacitor.