Coordinative template catalyzed/templated nanocarbon with ultrahigh mesoporosity for high-performance aqueous supercapacitor

Mesoporous carbon with high mesoporosity could overcome the diffusion limitations in the application fields requiring fast mass transportation. However, traditional templating approaches-derived carbons usually own low mesoporosity resulted from the microporosity dominated nanostructure. Herein, we developed a versatile method adopting self-made Fe(OH)(3) as coordinative template to absorb phenols by coordination effect and in situ inducing the polymerization of phenol and formaldehyde to form phenolic resin at Fe(OH)(3). Then, the generated H2O and the derived iron oxide from the template upon high temperature could serve as activation regents and mold constructing rich mesoporosity and graphitic structure. The derived products possess foam-like morphology, worm-like mesoporous structure, good graphitization degree, large surface area (1590 m(2)/g), large pore volume (2.86 cm(3)/g), uniform pore size distribution (similar to 3.1 nm), ultrahigh mesoporosity (98.6%) and exhibit an excellent energy storage performance for aqueous supercapacitor including large energy density of 30.6 Wh/kg, superior capacitance retention of 76.8% and long cycling stability with near 100% capacitance retention after 10 000 cycles at large current density of 20 A/g. The superior capacitance retention for SC implies a wide application potentiality of the developed mesoporous carbon in other fields closely related to fast mass transfer such as catalysis, sorption and so on.

Automated summary

The mesoporous carbon developed using self-made Fe(OH)(3) as a template showed excellent energy storage performance in aqueous supercapacitors, with superior capacitance retention and long cycling stability, indicating wide potential applications in fields related to fast mass transfer.