Solid-Phase Synthesis of Porous Carbon using Zinc Oxide Template

Hierarchical microporous/mesoporous carbons with high surface area were successfully synthesized using a versatile approach based on ZnO nanoparticles. The advantages of the process in this study are that the mesopore-forming template can be removed by carbonization of the ZnO@sucrose composite without any need for washing and/or activation treatments. Mesopores were formed to inherit the size and morphology from ZnO nanoparticles as templates. Using the resultant carbons as electrodes in electric double layer capacitors, mesopores formed in ZnO-templated carbons were confirmed to play an important role in achieving a high-rate performance. The large-scale rapid production and enhanced capacitive performances make this ZnO-templated solid-phase synthesis a very promising candidate for the industrial application of hierarchical microporous/mesoporous carbons.