Effect of static pressure on ultrasonic liquid phase exfoliation of few-layer graphene

Hu Zong; Minhui Gao; Aziz Ul Hassan Mohsan; Yibiao Lin; Ying Zhou; Lei Yu; Su Zhao; Yifei Li; Jiahao Zhang

doi:10.1016/j.ultsonch.2024.106863

Effect of static pressure on ultrasonic liquid phase exfoliation of few-layer graphene

Ultrason Sonochem. 2024 May:105:106863. doi: 10.1016/j.ultsonch.2024.106863. Epub 2024 Mar 28.

Authors

Hu Zong¹, Minhui Gao¹, Aziz Ul Hassan Mohsan², Yibiao Lin¹, Ying Zhou³, Lei Yu², Su Zhao⁴, Yifei Li², Jiahao Zhang²

Affiliations

¹ College of Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang University of Technology, Hangzhou 310014, China; Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo 315201, China.
² Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo 315201, China.
³ College of Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang University of Technology, Hangzhou 310014, China. Electronic address: yingzhou@zjut.edu.cn.
⁴ Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo 315201, China. Electronic address: zhaosu@nimte.ac.cn.

Abstract

Ultrasonic Liquid Phase Exfoliation (LPE) has gathered attention from both scientific and industrial communities for its accessibility and cost-effectiveness in producing graphene. However, this technique has faced challenges such as low yield and long production time. In this study, we developed a cyclic ultrasonication system to exfoliate expanded graphite (EG) by applying static pressure to a flow chamber to address these challenges. Using deionized water (DIW) as solvent and polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) as dispersion, we obtained graphene slurries with an average lateral size of 7 μm and averaged number of layers of 3.5 layers, after 40 min of ultrasonication. After centrifugation, the yield of single and bilayer graphene was approximately 16 %. The findings showed that regulating hydrostatic pressure can effectively affect the lateral size and number of layers of few-layer graphene. The proposed method is of good potential for scaled-up production of few-layer graphene.

Keywords: Graphene; Large-scale production; Static pressures; Ultrasonic liquid phase exfoliation.