Can we exfoliate graphene with the aid of solution?

The most common preparation of graphene is to exfoliate the graphite with scotch tape.
On the other hand, the researchers try to seek an alternative way to exfoliate the graphite stacks, that is, using various kinds of solvent to intercalate the graphite and exfoliate the stacks.

The most representational work is

Since the experiments in this paper seems to be relatively simple. I made a test immediately.
The solvent I chose is NMP (N-Methyl-2-pyrrolidone) which is the best solvent they concluded.
The mechanism is easily comprehended by the solvent-graphene interaction, but the main problem is that NMP is hard to evaporate in ambient condition. It can only be removed in vacuum with heat assistance.
After drying the solvent, the graphene flakes is so small to the extent that are difficult to process.

Meanwhile, something came to my mind, can we exfoliate the graphene sheets by similar technique used for dispersing CNT bundle? 

So I test this idea with a surfactant called NaDDBS (sodium dodecylbenzenesulfonate) which were used in our previous study of CNT-FET biosensor. The results is better, I was so happy with that !

Immediately, I searched the literature to see whether it has been published or not....
And then.......I found this one.....

I was so depressed about it..............
It was too late, they already published their work in Feb, 2009.
The early bird catches the worm.......

0 comments:

Post a Comment