Husam N. Alshareef

Substrate Dependent Self-Organization of Mesoporous Cobalt Oxide Nanowires with Remarkable Pseudocapacitance

A scheme of current collector dependent self-organization of mesoporous cobalt oxide nanowires has been used to create unique supercapacitor electrodes, with each nanowire making direct contact with the current collector. The fabricated electrodes offer the desired properties of macroporosity to allow facile electrolyte flow, thereby reducing device resistance and nanoporosity with large surface area to allow faster reaction kinetics. Co(3)O(4) nanowires grown on carbon fiber paper collectors self-organize into a brush-like morphology with the nanowires completely surrounding the carbon microfiber cores. In comparison, Co(3)O(4) nanowires grown on planar graphitized carbon paper collectors self-organize into a flower-like morphology. In three electrode configuration, brush-like and flower-like morphologies exhibited specific capacitance values of 1525 and 1199 F/g, respectively, at a constant current density of 1 A/g. In two electrode configuration, the brush-like nanowire morphology resulted in a superior supercapacitor performance with high specific capacitances of 911 F/g at 0.25 A/g and 784 F/g at 40 A/g. In comparison, the flower-like morphology exhibited lower specific capacitance values of 620 F/g at 0.25 A/g and 423 F/g at 40 A/g. The Co(3)O(4) nanowires with brush-like morphology exhibited high values of specific power (71 kW/kg) and specific energy (81 Wh/kg). Maximum energy and power densities calculated for Co(3)O(4) nanowires with flower-like morphology were 55 Wh/kg and 37 kW/kg respectively. Both electrode designs exhibited excellent cycling stability by retaining ∼91-94% of their maximum capacitance after 5000 cycles of continuous charge-discharge.

Symmetrical MnO2-carbon nanotube-textile nanostructures for wearable pseudocapacitors with high mass loading

While MnO(2) is a promising material for pseudocapacitor applications due to its high specific capacity and low cost, MnO(2) electrodes suffer from their low electrical and ionic conductivities. In this article, we report a structure where MnO(2) nanoflowers were conformally electrodeposited onto carbon nanotube (CNT)-enabled conductive textile fibers. Such nanostructures effectively decrease the ion diffusion and charge transport resistance in the electrode. For a given areal mass loading, the thickness of MnO(2) on conductive textile fibers is much smaller than that on a flat metal substrate. Such a porous structure also allows a large mass loading, up to 8.3 mg/cm(2), which leads to a high areal capacitance of 2.8 F/cm(2) at a scan rate of 0.05 mV/s. Full cells were demonstrated, where the MnO(2)-CNT-textile was used as a positive electrode, reduced MnO(2)-CNT-textile as a negative electrode, and 0.5 M Na(2)SO(4) in water as the electrolyte. The resulting pseudocapacitor shows promising results as a low-cost energy storage solution and an attractive wearable power.

One-Step Electrodeposited Nickel Cobalt Sulfide Nanosheet Arrays for High-Performance Asymmetric Supercapacitors

A facile one-step electrodeposition method is developed to prepare ternary nickel cobalt sulfide interconnected nanosheet arrays on conductive carbon substrates as electrodes for supercapacitors, resulting in exceptional energy storage performance. Taking advantages of the highly conductive, mesoporous nature of the nanosheets and open framework of the three-dimensional nanoarchitectures, the ternary sulfide electrodes exhibit high specific capacitance (1418 F g(-1) at 5 A g(-1) and 1285 F g(-1) at 100 A g(-1)) with excellent rate capability. An asymmetric supercapacitor fabricated by the ternary sulfide nanosheet arrays as positive electrode and porous graphene film as negative electrode demonstrates outstanding electrochemical performance for practical energy storage applications. Our asymmetric supercapacitors show a high energy density of 60 Wh kg(-1) at a power density of 1.8 kW kg(-1). Even when charging the cell within 4.5 s, the energy density is still as high as 33 Wh kg(-1) at an outstanding power density of 28.8 kW kg(-1) with robust long-term cycling stability up to 50,000 cycles.

Carbon nanotube-coated macroporous sponge for microbial fuel cell electrodes

The materials that are used to make electrodes and their internal structures significantly affect microbial fuel cell (MFC) performance. In this study, we describe a carbon nanotube (CNT)–sponge composite prepared by coating a sponge with CNTs. Compared to the CNT-coated textile electrodes evaluated in prior studies, CNT–sponge electrodes had lower internal resistance, greater stability, more tunable and uniform macroporous structure (pores up to 1 mm in diameter), and improved mechanical properties. The CNT–sponge composite also provided a three-dimensional scaffold that was favorable for microbial colonization and catalytic decoration. Using a batch-fed H-shaped MFC outfitted with CNT–sponge electrodes, an areal power density of 1.24 W m−2 was achieved when treating domestic wastewater. The maximum volumetric power density of a continuously fed plate-shaped MFC was 182 W m−3. To our knowledge, these are the highest values obtained to date for MFCs fed domestic wastewater: 2.5 times the previously reported maximum areal power density and 12 times the previously reported maximum volumetric power density.

High performance supercapacitors using metal oxide anchored graphene nanosheet electrodes

Metal oxide nanoparticles were chemically anchored onto graphene nanosheets (GNs) and the resultant composites—SnO2/GNs, MnO2/GNs and RuO2/GNs (58% of GNs loading)—coated over conductive carbon fabric substrates were successfully used as supercapacitor electrodes. The results showed that the incorporation of metal oxide nanoparticles improved the capacitive performance of GNs due to a combination of the effect of spacers and redox reactions. The specific capacitance values (with respect to the composite mass) obtained for SnO2/GNs (195 F g−1) and RuO2/GNs (365 F g−1) composites at a scan rate of 20 mV s−1 in the present study are the best ones reported to date for a two electrode configuration. The resultant supercapacitors also exhibited high values for maximum energy (27.6, 33.1 and 50.6 W h kg−1) and power densities (15.9, 20.4 and 31.2 kW kg−1) for SnO2/GNs, MnO2/GNs and RuO2/GNs respectively. These findings demonstrate the importance and great potential of metal oxide/GNs based composite coated carbon fabric in the development of high-performance energy-storage systems.

Selenide‐Based Electrocatalysts and Scaffolds for Water Oxidation Applications

Selenide-based electrocatalysts and scaffolds on carbon cloth are successfully fabricated and demonstrated for enhanced water oxidation applications. A max-imum current density of 97.5 mA cm(-2) at an overpotential of a mere 300 mV and a small Tafel slope of 77 mV dec(-1) are achieved, suggesting the potential of these materials to serve as advanced oxygen evolution reaction catalysts.

Qualitative model for the fatigue‐free behavior of SrBi2Ta2O9

SrBi2Ta2O9 (SBT) thin films are known to exhibit no polarization fatigue with electric field cycling. However, we have discovered that optical illumination combined with a bias voltage near the switching threshold can result in significant (≳90%) suppression of the switchable polarization of SBT thin film capacitors. A similar effect has also been reported for Pb(ZrxTi1−x)O3 (PZT) capacitors. However, it is found that electric field cycling of the optically fatigued SBT capacitors results in near‐complete recovery of the suppressed polarization. In contrast, electric field cycling of optically fatigued PZT capacitors does not result in any polarization recovery. These results suggest that optical fatigue in both SBT and PZT capacitors results from pinning of domain walls due to trapping of the photogenerated carriers at domain boundaries, whereas the recovery exhibited by SBT thin films indicates that the domain walls are more weakly pinned in SBT than in PZT thin films. Consequently, the fatigue‐free beh...

Photoinduced changes in the fatigue behavior of SrBi2Ta2O9 and Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 thin films

It is shown that SrBi2Ta2O9 (SBT) thin films can be made to exhibit significant polarization fatigue by electric‐field cycling under broad‐band, optical illumination. Photoinduced fatigue is also observed for Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 (PZT) thin‐film capacitors with (La,Sr)CoO3 (LSCO) electrodes. These results demonstrate that both the Pt/SBT/Pt and the LSCO/PZT/LSCO systems are susceptible to fatigue effects, which are attributed primarily to pinning of domain walls due to charge trapping. Capacitors that have been fatigued under illumination can be fully rejuvinated by applying a dc saturating bias with light or by electric‐field cycling without light, which indicates an intrinsic, field‐assisted recovery mechanism. We suggest that fatigue is essentially a competition between domain wall pinning and unpinning and that domain pinning is not necessarily absent in these nominally fatigue‐free systems, but rather these systems are ones in which unpinning occurs at least as rapidly as any pinning. In both cases, the exten...

Record Mobility in Transparent p-Type Tin Monoxide Films and Devices by Phase Engineering

Here, we report the fabrication of nanoscale (15 nm) fully transparent p-type SnO thin film transistors (TFT) at temperatures as low as 180 °C with record device performance. Specifically, by carefully controlling the process conditions, we have developed SnO thin films with a Hall mobility of 18.71 cm(2) V(-1) s(-1) and fabricated TFT devices with a linear field-effect mobility of 6.75 cm(2) V(-1) s(-1) and 5.87 cm(2) V(-1) s(-1) on transparent rigid and translucent flexible substrates, respectively. These values of mobility are the highest reported to date for any p-type oxide processed at this low temperature. We further demonstrate that this high mobility is realized by careful phase engineering. Specifically, we show that phase-pure SnO is not necessarily the highest mobility phase; instead, well-controlled amounts of residual metallic tin are shown to substantially increase the hole mobility. A detailed phase stability map for physical vapor deposition of nanoscale SnO is constructed for the first time for this p-type oxide.

Enhanced Rate Performance of Mesoporous Co3O4 Nanosheet Supercapacitor Electrodes by Hydrous RuO2 Nanoparticle Decoration

Mesoporous cobalt oxide (Co3O4) nanosheet electrode arrays are directly grown over flexible carbon paper substrates using an economical and scalable two-step process for supercapacitor applications. The interconnected nanosheet arrays form a three-dimensional network with exceptional supercapacitor performance in standard two electrode configuration. Dramatic improvement in the rate capacity of the Co3O4 nanosheets is achieved by electrodeposition of nanocrystalline, hydrous RuO2 nanoparticles dispersed on the Co3O4 nanosheets. An optimum RuO2 electrodeposition time is found to result in the best supercapacitor performance, where the controlled morphology of the electrode provides a balance between good conductivity and efficient electrolyte access to the RuO2 nanoparticles. An excellent specific capacitance of 905 F/g at 1 A/g is obtained, and a nearly constant rate performance of 78% is achieved at current density ranging from 1 to 40 A/g. The sample could retain more than 96% of its maximum capacitance even after 5000 continuous charge-discharge cycles at a constant high current density of 10 A/g. Thicker RuO2 coating, while maintaining good conductivity, results in agglomeration, decreasing electrolyte access to active material and hence the capacitive performance.