Controlling the functionalization of carbon nanostructures for energy related materials

Teresa Gatti^a, Enzo Menna^a

^aUniversity of Padova, Department of Chemical Sciences, Via Francesco Marzolo, 1, Padova, Italy

International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics
Proceedings of International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics 2015 (HOPV15)

Roma, Italy, 2015 May 11th - 13th

Organizer: Filippo De Angelis

Poster, Teresa Gatti, 446
Publication date: 5th February 2015

Synthetic procedures that have been developed to functionalize carbon nanostructures (CNSs) such as nanotubes (CNTs) and graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs) may require long reaction times and harsh conditions. Moreover, unlike common molecules, resulting products are hardly associated to a specific structure and may be rather described as a distribution of derivatives. In this context we have studied the continuous flow processing of carbon nanostructures with the aim not only to reduce reaction times but also to tune the properties of the functionalized carbon materials. We demonstrated the generation of reactive azomethineylides through different routes. A standardized characterization protocol, which merges UV/Vis/NIR, Raman, DLS and TGA, was employed to compare the products. Our methodology leads to derivatives with similar functionalisation degree (FD) of those reacted in a flask but with reaction times dramatically reduced compared to batch conditions [1,2] and a productivity almost two orders of magnitude higher. This finding could be of help to design synthetic strategies for specific applications that benefit either from a small fraction of product with very high solubility or from a larger amount with an average FD. The flow methodology was also extended to the fast and effective addition of diazonium salts to CNTs and also to the functionalization of GNPs. Besides reducing processing time, the flow approach allows to control the degree of CNTs functionalisation, leading to derivatives with enhanced solubility that retain the electronic properties of pristine tubes and can be used for organic electronics or photovoltaic applications [3]. In this perspective, we observed how an increase of FD affects the electronic communication of CNSs with a conjugated polymer (P3HT).[4] Our findings show that this is due not only to an increased density of defects, but probably also by the formation of multilayered organic structures that shield the carbon lattice [5].

[1] Chem. Commun. 2011,47, 9092-9094. [2] WO Patent 2,012,156,297: 2012. [3] Energy Environ. Sci. 2012, 5, 5919-5940. [4] J. Mat. Chem. C2014,DOI: 10.1039/b000000x. [5] Carbon 2014, 74, 73-82.

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