화학공학소재연구정보센터
Chemical Engineering Journal, Vol.345, 165-173, 2018
Triggering superior sodium ion adsorption on (200) facet of mesoporous WO3 nanosheet arrays for enhanced supercapacitance
Tungsten trioxide (WO3) is believed to be a promising electrode candidate for supercapacitors, due to its reversible surface redox reaction resulted from the almost same W-O bond lengths with different oxidation states. However, the specific capacitance of WO3 electrode is very low (< 250 mF cm(-2)) because of its low conductivity and slow surface redox reaction kinetics. Herein, to address these issues, mesoporous WO3 nanosheets with exposed (200) facets were anchored on activated carbon cloth (ACC) via a simple two-step process including heat treatment and alcohol-thermal process. The ACC was coated on WO3 seeds and proceed a heat treatment at 500 degrees C and the time of alcohol-thermal process were 7 h, 8 h, and 9 h labeled as WO3@ACC-n (n = 7, 8, 9). SEM and TEM images confirmed the WO3 nanosheets were successful anchored on the ACC. The WO3@ACC-8 electrode showed the best specific areal capacitance which could reach as high as 659 mF cm(-2) at a current density of 5 mA cm(-2) and superior stability with almost no decrease in 10,000 cycles in the presence of Na2SO4 as the neutral electrolyte. The capacitance is encouragingly much higher than the previously reported values in a three-electrode system in the neutral aqueous condition. DFT calculations reveal that, in comparison to the (002) and (020) facets, the exposed (200) facets of the mesoporous WO3 nanosheets triggers the superior Na+-adsorption, which accelerates the Na+-involved surface redox reaction for the boosted supercapacitor performance. A flexible asymmetric supercapacitor (FASC) was fabricated from the WO3@ACC electrode, which exhibits high energy density (0.5 mWh cm(-3)) and power density (62 mW cm(-3)) without any attenuation during +/- 180 degrees wide-angle bending.