Metal-Phenolic Networks as a Universal Aqueous Dispersing and Immobilizing Agent for Nanocarbon Materials: A Facile Strategy for Synthesis of Electronic and Energy Materials in the Aqueous Phase

applied in electronic and energy industries. With the rise of environmental concerns, nanocarbon material-based electronic and energy devices were prone to be fabricated by the aqueous process. Unfortunately, the low dispersibility of carbon nanomaterials in water and the strong pi-pi interaction between the carbon nanomaterials limited these processes. This research introduced a kind of metal-phenolic network, tannic acid-Fe3+ (TA-FeIII), as a universal aqueous dispersing and immobilizing agent for nanocarbon materials. The nanocarbon material-based electronic and energy materials were synthesized in the aqueous phase. Meanwhile, the TA-FeIII exhibits better-dispersing properties than TA because of its larger contact area with nanocarbon materials. The steered molecular dynamics simulation results also supported this point. They revealed that some arms of TA-FeIII could tightly attach to the surface of the NCM by pi-pi stacking interaction. To explore the potential application of NCM/TA-FeIII dispersion, we tried to synthesis of electronic and energy materials in the aqueous phase. The reduced graphene oxide (RGO)/TA-FeIII dispersion was used to fabricate anode materials of lithium batteries, which exhibit higher specific capacity than the cells that employed RGO or RGO/TA as anode materials. Moreover, the multiwalled carbon nanotube/TA-FeIII dispersion could self-assemble into a coating on chitosan hydrogel to improve its conductivity. The coated chitosan hydrogel exhibited sensitive electromechanical performance under cyclic compression-release. Hence, the metal-phenolic network/NCM dispersion can be used to fabricate wearable electronics and power storage devices in the aqueous phase.