Defect-Rich Graphene Nanomesh Produced by Thermal Exfoliation of Metal-Organic Frameworks for the Oxygen Reduction Reaction

Wei Xia; Jing Tang; Jingjing Li; Shuaihua Zhang; Kevin C-W Wu; Jianping He; Yusuke Yamauchi

doi:10.1002/anie.201906870

Defect-Rich Graphene Nanomesh Produced by Thermal Exfoliation of Metal-Organic Frameworks for the Oxygen Reduction Reaction

Angew Chem Int Ed Engl. 2019 Sep 16;58(38):13354-13359. doi: 10.1002/anie.201906870. Epub 2019 Aug 13.

Authors

Wei Xia^{1

2}, Jing Tang^{3

4}, Jingjing Li¹, Shuaihua Zhang², Kevin C-W Wu⁵, Jianping He¹, Yusuke Yamauchi^{2

4}

Affiliations

¹ College of Materials Science and Technology, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Materials and Technology for Energy Conversion, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 210016, Nanjing, China.
² International Center for Materials Nanoarchitectonics (MANA), National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), 1-1 Namiki, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-0044, Japan.
³ School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, Shanghai Key Laboratory of Green Chemistry and Chemical Processes East China Normal University, Shanghai, 200062, China.
⁴ School of Chemical Engineering and Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (AIBN), The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland, 4072, Australia.
⁵ Chemical Engineering, National (Taiwan) University, No. 1, Sec. 4, Roosevelt Road, Taipei, 10617, Taiwan.

PMID: 31407475
DOI: 10.1002/anie.201906870

Abstract

Although graphene nanomesh is an attractive 2D carbon material, general synthetic routes to produce functional graphene nanomesh in large-scale are complex and tedious. Herein, we elaborately design a simple two-step dimensional reduction strategy for exploring nitrogen-doped graphene nanomesh by thermal exfoliation of crystal- and shape-modified metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). MOF nanoleaves with 2D rather than 3D crystal structure are used as the precursor, which are further thermally unraveled into nitrogen-doped graphene nanomesh by using metal chlorides as the exfoliators and etching agent. The nitrogen-doped graphene nanomesh has a unique ultrathin two-dimensional morphology, high porosity, rich and accessible nitrogen-doped active sites, and defective graphene edges, contributing to an unprecedented catalytic activity for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) in acid electrolytes. This approach is suitable for scalable production.

Keywords: 2D materials; exfoliation; graphene nanomesh; metal-organic frameworks (MOFs); oxygen reduction reaction (ORR).