X-Ray Diffraction Evaluation of the Average Number of Layers in Thermal Reduced Graphene Powder for Supercapacitor Nanomaterial

Graphene oxide (GO) can be partially reduced to graphene-like sheets by removing the oxygen-containing groups and recovering the conjugated structure. In this work, the thermal reduction of GO powder has been carried out using back pumping vacuum pressures and investigated employing X-ray diffraction analysis. The experimental results of estimating the number of graphene layers on the reduced powder at various temperatures (200 – 1000 °C) have been reported. Electrical changes have been produced in a graphene oxide with the vacuum reduction process. This study has shown that the ideal processing temperature for reducing graphene oxide nanomaterial was about 400 °C. It has also been shown that at 600 °C the number of layers in the reduced nanomaterial increased. The internal series equivalent resistance (ESR) has been improved substantially with the vacuum thermal treatment even at temperatures above 400 °C. ESR was reduced from 95.0 to about 13.8 Ω cm2 with this processing. These results showed that the process can be applied to the reduction of graphene oxide to produce supercapacitor nanomaterials. The advantage of employing this method is that the processing is a straightforward and low cost thermal treatment that might be used for large amount of nanocomposite material.