Highly Crystalline Mesoporous C-60 with Ordered Pores: A Class of Nanomaterials for Energy Applications

Highly ordered mesoporous C-60 with a well-ordered porous structure and a high crystallinity is prepared through the nanohard templating method using a saturated solution of C-60 in 1-chloronaphthalene (51 mgmL(-1)) as a C-60 precursor and SBA-15 as a hard template. The high solubility of C-60 in 1-chloronaphthalene helps not only to encapsulate a huge amount of the C-60 into the mesopores of the template but also supports the oligomerization of C-60 and the formation of crystalline walls made of C-60. The obtained mesoporous C-60 exhibits a rod-shaped morphology, a high specific surface area (680 m(2) g(-1)), tuneable pores, and a highly crystalline wall structure. This exciting ordered mesoporous C-60 offers high supercapacitive performance and a high selectivity to H2O2 production and methanol tolerance for ORR. This simple strategy could be adopted to make a series of mesoporous fullerenes with different structures and carbon atoms as a new class of energy materials.