Fabrication of Binder-Free TiO2 Nanofibers@Carbon Cloth for Flexible and Ultra-Stable Supercapacitor for Wearable Electronics

For the realization of the miniaturized devices for flexible/wearable electronics systems in the current electronics industry; flexible, safe, and compatible energy storage devices are of great research interest. Herein, carbon cloth (CC) textile is coated by TiO2 nanofibers (NFs) through a safe and facile electrophoretic deposition (EPD) technique for flexible/wearable supercapacitor (SC) application. The modified microstructure of the flexible and binder-free electrode fabricated via EPD shows a high areal capacitance of 1651 mF cm(-2) at 1 mA cm(-2) current density. Moreover, the electrode shows the high cyclability with 100% capacitance retention after 15 000 cycles at 10 mA cm(-2) current density, presents the ultra-high stability for the fabricated electrode. Further, a fully flexible symmetric SC device is fabricated utilizing the fabricated electrodes assembled with the gel electrolyte. The device delivers an areal capacitance of 468 mF cm(-2) at 1 mA cm(-2) current density with 97% capacitance retention after 30 000 successive cycles and 98% retention after 2000 bending cycles at 5 mA cm(-2). Moreover, the SC device delivers the maximum areal energy density and areal power density of 0.14 mWh cm(-2) and 3.6 mW cm(-2), respectively.

Automated summary

In this study, flexible/wearable supercapacitors were fabricated by coating carbon cloth with TiO2 nanofibers using electrophoretic deposition. The electrodes and devices showed high capacitance retention and stability after multiple cycles and bending tests.