Influence of Surface Functional Group of Carbon Nanotubes for Applications in Electrochemical Capacitors

Electrochemical capacitors have been the most strong energy storage devices due to high power density and long cycle stability. Pristine carbon nanotubes are promising electrode materials for excellent electrical conductivity and high specific surface area in electrochemical capacitor. However, the practical application of pristine carbon nanotubes was limited by the aggregation into bundles due to van der Waals force. In this research, we explained how multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) functionalized by carboxyl, sulfonic, and amine groups (CNT-COOH, CNT-SO3H, CNT-NH2) to improve the performances of MWCNT. Functionalized CNTs showed two- to four-fold increase in capacitance over that of pristine CNTs, while maintaining reasonable cyclic stability. But, the CNT-COOH showed the lowest rate capability of 57% compared to 84%, 86% of CNT-SO3H and CNT-NH2. As demonstrated by the spectroscopic analysis, This reseach showed how surface functional group of carbon nanotubes change capacitor performances.