Elastic carbon foam via direct carbonization of polymer foam for flexible electrodes and organic chemical absorption

Abstract

Commonly, commercially available carbon foam derived from polymers shows brittle characteristics. In this paper, the concept of preparing an elastic carbon foam via the direct carbonization of a polymer foam is presented. A novel carbon foam with a 3D elastic interconnected network was prepared by the direct carbonization of melamine foam. The as-prepared carbon foam exhibited characteristics including excellent elasticity, extremely high porosity of over 99.6%, being lightweight with a density of 5 mg cm⁻³, a high specific surface area, tailored electrical conductivity, super-hydrophobicity and excellent absorptive properties towards oil and organic solvents. Two example applications as flexible electrodes and as an organic chemical absorbent have been demonstrated. For use as an electrode in supercapacitors, it could exhibit a specific capacitance of more than 250 F g⁻¹ in 1 M H₂SO₄ at a charge/discharge current density of 0.5 A g⁻¹. For use as an absorbent, it was able to absorb 148 to 411 times its own weight of organic solvents depending on the density of the solvents.