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    Performance evaluation of conductive additives for activated carbon supercapacitors in organic electrolyte
    (Amsterdam : Elsevier, 2016) Jäckel, Nicolas; Weingarth, Daniel; Schreiber, Anna; Krüner, Benjamin; Zeiger, Marco; Tolosa Rodriguez, Aura Monserrat; Aslan, Mesut; Presser, Volker
    In this study, we investigate two different activated carbons and four conductive additive materials, all produced in industrial scale from commercial suppliers. The two activated carbons differed in porosity: one with a narrow microporous pore size distribution, the other showed a broader micro-mesoporous pore structure. Electrochemical benchmarking was done in one molar tetraethylammonium tetrafluoroborate in acetonitrile. Comprehensive structural, chemical, and electrical characterization was carried out by varied techniques. This way, we correlate the electrochemical performance with composite electrode properties, such as surface area, pore volume, electrical conductivity, and mass loading for different admixtures of conductive additives to activated carbon. The electrochemical rate handling (from 0.1 A g−1 to 10 A g−1) and long-time stability testing via voltage floating (100 h at 2.7 V cell voltage) show the influence of functional surface groups on carbon materials and the role of percolation of additive particles.
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    Graphitization as a universal tool to tailor the potential-dependent capacitance of carbon supercapacitors
    (Hoboken, NJ : Wiley, 2014) Weingarth, Daniel; Zeiger, Marco; Jäckel, Nicolas; Aslan, Mesut; Feng, Guang; Presser, Volker
    Most efforts to improve the energy density of supercapacitors are currently dedicated to optimized porosity or hybrid devices employing pseudocapacitive elements. Little attention has been given to the effects of the low charge carrier density of carbon on the total material capacitance. To study the effect of graphitization on the differential capacitance, carbon onion (also known as onion-like carbon) supercapacitors are chosen. The increase in density of states (DOS) related to the low density of charge carriers in carbon materials is an important effect that leads to a substantial increase in capacitance as the electrode potential is increased. Using carbon onions as a model, it is shown that this phenomenon cannot be related only to geometric aspects but must be the result of varying graphitization. This provides a new tool to significantly improve carbon supercapacitor performance, in addition to having significant consequences for the modeling community where carbons usually are approximated to be ideal metallic conductors. Data on the structure, composition, and phase content of carbon onions are presented and the correlation between electrochemical performance and electrical resistance and graphitization is shown. Highly graphitic carbons show a stronger degree of electrochemical doping, making them very attractive for enhancing the capacitance.