Sulfuric acid intercalated graphite oxide for graphene preparation

Abstract

Graphene has shown enormous potential for innovation in various research fields. The current chemical approaches based on exfoliation of graphite via graphite oxide (GO) are potential for large-scale synthesis of graphene but suffer from high cost, great operation difficulties, and serious waste discharge. We report a facile preparation of graphene by rapid reduction and expansion exfoliation of sulfuric acid intercalated graphite oxide (SIGO) at temperature just above 100 C in ambient atmosphere, noting that SIGO is easily available as the immediate oxidation descendent of graphite in sulfuric acid. The oxygenic and hydric groups in SIGO are mainly removed through dehydration as catalyzed by the intercalated sulfuric acid (ISA). The resultant consists of mostly single layer graphene sheets with a mean diameter of 1.07 μm after dispersion in DMF. This SIGO process is reductant free, easy operation, low-energy, environmental friendly and generates graphene with low oxygen content, less defect and high conductivity. The provided synthesis route from graphite to graphene via SIGO is compact and readily scalable.