Nitrogen-doped graphene nanosheet-double-walled carbon nanotube hybrid nanostructures for high-performance supercapacitors

Abstract

A hybrid nitrogen-doped graphene nanosheet-grafted double-walled carbon nanotube (NG-DWCNT) was synthesized by chemical vapor deposition (CVD). Double-walled carbon nanotube (DWCNT) was synthesized by floating catalytic CVD using ferrocene and thiophene dissolved in ethanol. NG was directly grafted onto the DWCNT bundles by thermal CVD using mixed ethanol-urea solution. The NG possess sharp-edged petal-like structure on one-dimensional DWCNT bundle. The NG-DWCNT showed the nitrogen content of approximately 1.93 at%. The NG-DWCNT hybrid nanostructures exhibited a higher specific capacitance of 563 F g−1 than that of the DWCNT and un-doped G-DWCNT. The improvement of capacitance value is attributed to the synergic effect of the nitrogen doping together with the sharp-edged petal-like structure of the NG. The facile technique by CVD method provides a promising approach for simple and low-cost technique to synthesize the NG-DWCNT hybrid nanostructures. A hybrid carbon nanostructure of NG-DWCNT has a potential application in electrochemical conversion and energy storage devices.