Adenine-Derived Nitrogen-doped Porous Carbon for High-Performance Supercapacitor Electrodes and Carbon Dioxide Capture

Abstract

We present a sustainable pathway for the synthesis of nitrogen-doped porous carbon (NPC) via hydrothermal carbonization coupled with KOH activation using biobased adenine and glucose as nitrogen sources and carbon sources, respectively. The porosity and chemical properties of NPC can be tailored by the activation temperature and the amount of activation agent. The as-synthesized NPC possesses abundant ultramicropores (approximately 0.7 nm), an ultrahigh surface area (up to 3273 m2 g-1) and a nitrogen content of 7.03 wt%. As a supercapacitor electrode, NPC exhibits a high specific capacitance of 333 F g-1 at 0.5 A g-1 in 6.0 M KOH and an excellent cycle stability (retaining 92.7% specific capacitance after 5000 cycles). Moreover, NPC shows high CO2 uptake of 6.7 mmol g-1 (at 0 °C) and 4.4 mmol g-1 (at 25 °C) at 1 bar, as well as excellent CO2 selectivity against N2. These results indicate that the obtained NPC is a promising electrode material for supercapacitors and solid adsorbents for CO2 capture.