EE 4thyr Projects 2015/2016
Project Title:	Nanocarbon composites, including graphene, for Supercapacitors
Supervisor:	Prof Richard Jackman		Submitted on: Thursday 19th February 2015

The DEG has developed an extensive ‘tool-box’ for the creation and fuctionalisation of nanocarbon (NC) materials. These processes, for example, include plasma treatments for hydrogenation, oxidation, fluorination or nitridation of NCs, or chemical approaches for the attachment of, for example, amine groups as linkers to more complex organic moieties. The NCs may be nanodiamonds (NDs), carbon nano-onions (CNOs), carbon nanotubes (CNTs) or graphene. The group has also developed ‘linkage’ chemistry to create ‘nanowires’ of these nanocarbon forms, which can be important in terms of the creation of, for example, percoloration conduction within a nanocomposite material.

Supercapacitors: the need
Supercapacitors or ultracapacitors have attracted considerable attention owing to their excellent power densities that overcome the shortcomings of lithium secondary batteries. These capacitor types are generally categorized into two types according to the charge-storage mechanism. Firstly, electric double-layer capacitors (EDLCs) consist mostly of activated carbon. The capacitance of EDLCs is proportional to the specific surface area of the electrodes. The other class, pseudocapacitors, are based on materials with a pseudocapacitive effect, such as conducting polymers, metal oxides, or residual functional groups on the surface. To enhance the supercapacitive behaviour, porous carbon materials with a controllable pore size on the nanometre scale and a high specific surface area are needed; this is one aspect of the proposed activity.

Whilst a number of research programmes are currently addressing the surface area of carbon materials, and their porosity related to ionic processes involved in charge storage, little activity in terms of controlling the surface chemical terminations that ultimately control the electrode-electrolyte interaction are apparent; this is the second aspect of the proposed activity.

CNOs, and similar nanocarbons (such a graphene flakes) will be combined with carbon-based 3D structures to form novel composites with properties tuned for SC applications.

Project partners:
Lockheed Martin Inc.
http://www.lockheedmartin.com/
Applied Nanostructured Solutions llc
http://www.appliednanostructuredsolutions.com/