3D porous and ultralight carbon hybrid nanostructure fabricated from carbon foam covered by monolayer of nitrogen-doped carbon nanotubes for high performance supercapacitors

3D porous and self-supported carbon hybrids are promising electrode materials for supercapacitor application attributed to their prominent properties such as binder-free electrode fabrication process, excellent electric conductivity and high power density etc. We present here a facile chemical vapor deposition method to fabricate a novel 3D flexible carbon hybrid nanostructure by growing a monolayer of nitrogen-doped carbon nanotubes on the skeleton of carbon foam (N-CNTs/CF) with Fe nanoparticle as catalyst. With such 3D porous, flexible and ultralight carbon nanostructure as binder-free electrode material, large surface area is available and fast ionic transport is facilitated. Moreover, the carbon-based network can provide excellent electronic conductivity. The electrochemical studies demonstrate that the supercapacitor constructed from the N-CNTs/CF hybrid exhibit high power density of 69.3 kW kg(-1) and good stability with capacitance retention ration above 95% after cycled at 50 A g(-1) for 5000 cycles. Therefore, the prepared porous N-CNTs/CF nanostructure is expected to be a type of excellent electrode material for electrical double layer capacitors. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.