Capacitive Performance of Reduced Graphene Oxide Modified Sodium Ion-Intercalated Manganese Oxide Composite Electrode

Abstract

The reduced graphene oxide modified sodium ion-intercalated manganese oxide (RGO-NaxMnO2) is designed as a supercapacitor electrode material. The layered intercalation compound NaxMnO2 is prepared through a solid-state reaction process. RGO-NaxMnO2 is then formed by the chemical reduction of graphene oxide coated NaxMnO2 through a hydrothermal process. RGO-NaxMnO2 is supported on the substrate of nickel form (NF) and titanium nitride (TiN) to form RGO-NaxMnO2/NF and RGO-NaxMnO2/TiN composite electrodes. NaxMnO2 has a particle aggregate structure with the individual particle size of 1–2 µm. RGO-NaxMnO2 composite shows the densely packed arrangement of particles with the particle aggregate size of 8 µm. RGO modification can well improve the electrical conductivity of RGO-NaxMnO2. The current response is highly enhanced from 0.127 A g−1 for NaxMnO2/NF to 0.372 A g−1 for RGO-NaxMnO2/NF at 2 mV s−1. Furthermore, the TiN substrate with superior electrical conductivity and electrochemical anti-corrosion contributes to improving the electrochemical capacitance and cycle stability of RGO-NaxMnO2. RGO-NaxMnO2/TiN reveals higher specific capacitance (244.2 F g−1 at 2.0 A g−1) and higher cycling capacitance retention (99.7%) after 500 cycles at 2.0 A g−1 than RGO-NaxMnO2/NF (177.1 F g−1, 43.6%). So, RGO-NaxMnO2/TiN exhibits much higher capacitive performance than RGO-NaxMnO2/NF, which presents a potential application for electrochemical energy storage.