Quan, T.; Goubard-Bretesche, N.; Haerk, E.; Kochovski, Z.; Mei, S.; Pinna, N.; Ballauff, M.; Lu, Y.: Highly Dispersible Hexagonal Carbon-MoS2-Carbon Nanoplates with Hollow Sandwich Structures for Supercapacitors. Chemistry - A European Journal 25 (2019), p. 4745-4766
10.1002/chem.201806060
Open Access Version
Abstract:
MoS2, a typical layered transition metal dichalcogenide is promising as an electrode material in supercapacitors. However, its low electrical conductivity could lead to limited capacitance when applied in electrochemical devices. Here, a new nanostructure made of hollow carbon-MoS2-carbon was successfully synthesized by a L-cysteine assisted hydrothermal method using gibbsite as a template and polydopamine as a carbon precursor. After calcination and etching of the gibbsite template, uniform hollow platelets, which are made of a sandwich-like assembly of the partial graphitic carbon and the two-dimensional layered MoS2 flakes, were obtained. The platelets showed excellent dispersibility and stability in water and good electrical conductivity due to the carbon provided by the calcination of the polydopamine coatings. The hollow nanoplate morphology of the material provided a high specific surface area of 543 m2/g, a total pore volume of 0.677 cm3/g and fairly small mesopores (~5.3 nm). The material was applied in a symmetric supercapacitor and exhibited a specific capacitance of 248 F/g (0.12 F/cm²) at a constant current density of 0.1 A/g, suggesting that the hollow carbon-MoS2-carbon nanoplates are promising candidate materials for supercapacitors.