Nanosized Graphane (C1H1.14)n By Hydrogenation Of Carbon ...

Nanosized graphane (C1H1.14)n by hydrogenation of carbon nanofibers by Birch reduction method†

Daniel Bouša,a Jan Luxa,a David Sedmidubský,a Štěpán Huber,a Ondřej Jankovský,a Martin Pumera*b and Zdeněk Sofer*a Author affiliations

* Corresponding authors

a Department of Inorganic Chemistry, University of Chemistry and Technology Prague, 166 28 Prague 6, Czech Republic E-mail: zdenek.sofer@vscht.cz Fax: +420-22431-0422

b Division of Chemistry & Biological Chemistry, School of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore E-mail: pumera@ntu.edu.sg Fax: +65-6791-1961

Abstract

Graphane, fully hydrogenated graphene with the composition (C1H1)n, has been theoretically predicted but never experimentally realized. Graphane stands out of the variety of heteroatom modified graphene for its well defined structure. Here we show that by employing Birch reduction on graphite nanofibers, one can reach hydrogenation levels close to 100%. We name this material graphane or graphane-like since its composition is relatively close to ideal theoretical stoichiometry C1H1. We systematically study the effect of the size and structure of the starting material and conditions of the synthesis. The morphology and properties of the synthesized graphane-like material are strongly dependent on the structure of the starting material. The extremely highly hydrogenated nanographanes should find applications ranging from nanoelectronics to electrochemistry such as in supercapacitors or electrocatalysts.

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