Nanocarbons from rice husk by microwave plasma irradiation: From graphene and carbon nanotubes to graphenated carbon nanotube hybrids

Abstract Recently, graphene and carbon nanotube (CNT) composites have attracted great interest of scientists and exhibited fascinating properties even better than they could on their own. Here, we have synthesized the graphenated CNTs (g-CNTs), one of graphene–CNT composites, from waste rice husk (RH) by one-step microwave plasma irradiation (MPI) process. The RH-derived g-CNTs were composed of graphene standing on the sidewalls of CNTs, in which the graphene sheets possessed a large amount of sharp edges, which mainly consisted of 2–6 layers, and the CNTs had several tens of micrometers in length and 50–200 in diameter. They offer great promise in the application of electrochemical electrodes due to their special features including high surface area and specific capacitance. The successful MPI technique can be spread to other waste biomass, in which their components are made of cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin similar to RHs, to fabricate high-added-value nanocarbons including graphene, CNTs, and g-CNTs, which were dependent of experimental pressure.