Porous N self-doped carbon materials for high-performance supercapacitors via nanosized silica template combined with pyrolysis method

Advanced carbon with tunable priority and composition have been considered as the promising component for electrode materials of high-performance supercapacitor. Herein, the nitrogen self-doped porous carbon materials (NPCM) are fabricated via a one-step pyrolysis using 4,4′-bis (3,4-dicyanophenoxy) biphenyl (BPh) and nanosized silica as the precursor and sacrificial template, respectively. It was found that the obtained NPCM showed moderate specific surface area (550.5 m2 g−1) with nitrogen content of 2.1 at.%. Meanwhile, the electrode material based on the prepared NPCM exhibited great specific capacitance of 248 F g−1 at current density of 1 A g−1. The great capacitive performance is mainly due to the interaction of the following two factors: (i) the appropriate pore structure that facilitates the ion adsorption and transportation; (ii) the C–O, C=O, and N-6 functional groups derived from heteroatom doping, which contribute to increase pseudocapacitance active sites. Thanks to its tunable porosity and electrochemical properties, the novel NPCM electrode materials can have a promising prospect in the application to high-performance supercapacitors.