Nanoclay assisted electrochemical exfoliation of pencil core to high conductive graphene thin-film electrode.

Nanoclay assisted electrochemical exfoliation was developed to in-situ form functionalized graphene electrode materials from pencil core with different ratios of graphite and clay. This method made a positive transformation from solid graphite to graphene colloidal solution, which can be used to construct binder- and additive-free thin-film electrodes. Exfoliated graphene can be served as both conductive current collector (film resistance of 33Ω/square) and electrode materials. Graphene thin-film electrodes from pencil cores displayed higher capacity of 224 than 80mAh/g of that from pure graphite. The electrochemical performance can be controlled by the ratio of graphite and clay and the oxidation reaction of surface oxygen functional groups. The described nanoclay-assisted electrochemical oxidation route shows great potential for the synthesis of functionalized graphene electrode materials for high-conductive thin-film lithium ion batteries and supercapacitors.