Functions of hydroxyapatite in fabricating N-doped carbon for excellent catalysts and supercapacitors

Abstract

Functions of hydroxyapatite (HAP) in fabricating nitrogen-containing carbon materials with 1,10-phenanthroline as a precursor were demonstrated. HAP can efficiently prevent 1,10-phenanthroline from subliming and promote it to graphitized carbon during the annealing process. More importantly, HAP favored the generation of active oxygen-containing groups on the final nitrogen-doped carbon NC(HAP), which exhibited excellent catalytic performance for the oxidative coupling of amines to imines (yield 84–95%) and remarkable electrochemical performance for supercapacitors. In electrochemical experiments, NC(HAP) exhibited an outstanding specific capacitance of 366 F g⁻¹ at 0.5 A g⁻¹ and an excellent capacitance retention of 98.5% after 5000 charge–discharge cycles at 10 A g⁻¹.