Langmuir. 2016 Apr 12;32(14):3552-9. doi: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.5b04209. Epub 2016 Apr 04.

Shear Assisted Electrochemical Exfoliation of Graphite to Graphene.

Langmuir : the ACS journal of surfaces and colloids

Dhanraj B Shinde, Jason Brenker, Christopher D Easton, Rico F Tabor, Adrian Neild, Mainak Majumder

PMID: 27043919 DOI: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.5b04209

Abstract

The exfoliation characteristics of graphite as a function of applied anodic potential (1-10 V) in combination with shear field (400-74 400 s(-1)) have been studied in a custom-designed microfluidic reactor. Systematic investigation by atomic force microscopy (AFM) indicates that at higher potentials thicker and more fragmented graphene sheets are obtained, while at potentials as low as 1 V, pronounced exfoliation is triggered by the influence of shear. The shear-assisted electrochemical exfoliation process yields large (∼10 μm) graphene flakes with a high proportion of single, bilayer, and trilayer graphene and small ID/IG ratio (0.21-0.32) with only a small contribution from carbon-oxygen species as demonstrated by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy measurements. This method comprises intercalation of sulfate ions followed by exfoliation using shear induced by a flowing electrolyte. Our findings on the crucial role of hydrodynamics in accentuating the exfoliation efficiency suggest a safer, greener, and more automated method for production of high quality graphene from graphite.

Publication Types

• Journal Article
• Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't