575
Synthesis of Graphene Nanosheets for the Energy Sector By Electrochemical Exfoliation of Graphite in Sulfonated Ionic Liquids

Tuesday, 30 May 2017
Grand Ballroom (Hilton New Orleans Riverside)
E. Cuara-Diaz, D. Morales-Acosta, S. Fernández Tavizón, and R. Benavides (Centro de Investigación en Química Aplicada)
Graphene has gained increasing attention of the scientific community due to its properties and wide range of applications many beneficial properties. One of the most promising applications is as electrode material for the production of energy in fuel cells and Lition-ion batteries. Various synthesis procedures has been developed but most of them are unable to generate graphene flakes in bulk, in addition, it usually takes several hours to synthetize a batch, requires high temperatures and produce several sub-products, some of them toxic. The electrochemical synthesis of graphene provides a facile, fast, scalable, economic and environmental friendly pathway to the production of graphene flakes. In this work, we analyze the properties of electrochemical exfoliated graphite using different sulphonated ionic liquids as reactant media. The graphene sheets were synthetized via electrochemical methods by intercalation, oxidation and reduction of graphite bar. The physicochemical properties of the generated graphene were evaluated trough TEM, SEM and FT-IR and Raman spectroscopies. Our results show that synthesis by ionic liquids allows a better control on the physical properties of the graphene sheets compared to the traditional synthesis such as the Hummers method.