A polymer-direct-intercalation strategy for MoS2/carbon-derived heteroaerogels with ultrahigh pseudocapacitance

• Published in: Nature communications Vol. 10; no. 1; p. 1372
• Main Authors: Feng, Nan, Meng, Ruijin, Zu, Lianhai, Feng, Yutong, Peng, Chengxin, Huang, Jimei, Liu, Guanglei, Chen, Bingjie, Yang, Jinhu
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 26.03.2019; Nature Publishing Group; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 119/118; 140/133; 140/146; 140/58; 147/135; 147/143; 639/301/299/161; 639/4077/4079/4105; 639/638/298/917; Capacitance; Carbon; Carbonization; Charge transport; Composite materials; Energy storage; Humanities and Social Sciences; Intercalation; Interlayers; Layered materials; Metal ions; Molecular dynamics; Molybdenum disulfide; multidisciplinary; Polyethylene glycol; Polyethyleneimine; Polymer matrix composites; Polymers; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Strategy; Three dimensional composites; Two dimensional materials
• DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-09384-7
• ISSN: 2041-1723

The intercalation strategy has become crucial for 2D layered materials to achieve desirable properties, however, the intercalated guests are often limited to metal ions or small molecules. Here, we develop a simple, mild and efficient polymer-direct-intercalation strategy that different polymers (polyethyleneimine and polyethylene glycol) can directly intercalate into the MoS 2 interlayers, forming MoS 2 -polymer composites and interlayer-expanded MoS 2 /carbon heteroaerogels after carbonization. The polymer-direct-intercalation behavior has been investigated by substantial characterizations and molecular dynamic calculations. The resulting composite heteroaerogels possess 3D conductive MoS 2 /C frameworks, expanded MoS 2 interlayers (0.98 nm), high MoS 2 contents (up to 74%) and high Mo valence (+6), beneficial to fast and stable charge transport and enhanced pseudocapacitive energy storage. Consequently, the typical MoS 2 /N-doped carbon heteroaerogels exhibit outstanding supercapacitor performance, such as ultrahigh capacitance, remarkable rate capability and excellent cycling stability. This study offers a new intercalation strategy which may be generally applicable to 2D materials for promising energy applications. Methods to fabricate layered materials are often associated with harsh conditions and complicated manipulations. Here the authors report a polymer-direct-intercalation strategy to synthesize composite heteroaerogels consisting of molybdenum sulfide/carbon nanosheets for high-capacitance supercapacitors.