Synthesis of an architectural electrode based on manganese oxide and carbon nanotubes for flexible supercapacitors

We report the synthesis of an architectural electrode by electrophoretic deposition of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) on a graphite sheet (GS) substrate, followed by electrodeposition of manganese oxide (MnO2) nanoclusters into a three-dimensional network structure of CNT to form MnO2 embedded-CNTs/GS. The novel architecture, in which disconnected MnO2 nanoclusters were embedded in an interconnected 3D CNT network, was beneficial to improve the electrochemical utilization of MnO2 for charge storage. Therefore, the MnO2 embedded-CNTs/GS showed a fairly high specific capacitance of 540.7F/g (based on MnO2), an excellent rate capability and a good cycling stability (less 10% loss of its initial capacitance after 1000 cycles).