Synthesis and electrochemical properties of various dimensional poly(1,5-diaminoanthraquinone) nanostructures: Nanoparticles, nanotubes and nanoribbons

Nanostructured conducting polymers show their promising potential as electrode materials for supercapacitors. Here, chemical oxidation polymerization of 1,5-diaminoanthraquinone (DAA) was conducted with HClO4 as initiator and (NH4)(2) S2O8 as oxidant in different solvent systems. Due to the different solubilities of its oligomers, different poly(1,5-diaminoanthraquinone) (PDAA) nanostructures were obtained, such as nanoparticles, nanotubes and nanoribbons. As electrode materials, the PDAA nanotubes synthesized in 1:1 CH3CN/DMF mixture possessed the highest specific capacitance of 353 F/g at 1 A/g and the best rate capability with the capacitance retention of 52% even at 20 A/g in 1 M H2SO4 electrolyte, while the PDAA nanoparticles synthesized in DMF showed the best cycling stability of 111% of its initial capacitance after 10,000 CV cycles at 100 mV/s, despite the same chemical structure with different morphologies. (C) 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.