Three-dimensional kenaf stem-derived macroporous carbon/reduced graphene oxide/polyaniline integrated electrode for supercapacitors

Abstract

Three-dimensional kenaf stem-derived macroporous carbon (3D-KSC)/reduced graphene oxide (rGO) integrated electrode were constructed as conductive support substrate to electrodeposit polyaniline (PANI) for building high-performance supercapacitors. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Raman spectroscopy, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and electrochemical methods were used to characterize the 3D-KSCs/rGO/PANI electrode. It was found by SEM that lots of well-dispersed rGO uniformly grew on 3D-KSC based on covalent bond, which effectively avoided the aggregation of rGO on the electrode surface. FTIR and Raman spectroscopy confirmed that PANI arrays were polymerized on the 3D-KSCs/rGO surface vertically and uniformly. Constant current charging/discharging test was used to investigate the electrochemical properties of 3D-KSCs/rGO/PANI electrode. These test results showed that as-obtained 3D-KSCs/rGO/PANI supercapacitor electrode had gravimetric capacitance of 1224 mF g-1 at the current density of 0.3 A g−1, far larger than most other electrodes. In addition, the gravimetric capacitance remained 87% after 5000 charging/discharging cycles. The good performances of 3D-KSCs/rGO/PANI integrated electrode proved that the resulted supercapacitor electrode had wide prospect in energy storage application.