Ultrathin Ni_1−xCo_xS₂ nanoflakes as high energy density electrode materials for asymmetric supercapacitors

• Xiaoxiang Wang,
• Teng Wang,
• Rusen Zhou,
• Lijuan Fan,
• Shengli Zhang,
• Feng Yu,
• Tuquabo Tesfamichael,
• Liwei Su and
• Hongxia Wang

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2207–2216, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.213

• curves of the ASC at different potential windows with a scan rate of 10 mV·s−1; (c) CV curves of the device at various sweep rates and (d) GCD curves of ASC at different charging/discharge current densities; and (e) the corresponding specific capacitance, (f) cycling stability of the ASC under a current

Oblique angle deposition of nickel thin films by high-power impulse magnetron sputtering

• Hamidreza Hajihoseini,
• Movaffaq Kateb,
• Snorri Þorgeir Ingvarsson and
• Jon Tomas Gudmundsson

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1914–1921, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.186

• was 25 cm. We used thermally oxidized Si(001) with an oxide thickness of 100 nm as substrates. However, for the scanning electron microscopy studies, Si(001) substrates with native oxide were used in order to eliminate the charging effect. All films were deposited at room temperature (25 °C) with a

Tuning the performance of vanadium redox flow batteries by modifying the structural defects of the carbon felt electrode

• Ditty Dixon,
• Deepu Joseph Babu,
• Aiswarya Bhaskar,
• Hans-Michael Bruns,
• Joerg J. Schneider,
• Frieder Scheiba and
• Helmut Ehrenberg

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1698–1706, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.165

• the charging current reached less than 10 mA cm−2. All the cyclic voltammetry measurements were carried out at a scan rate of 5 mV s−1. Single-cell measurements were performed using a modified direct methanol fuel cell from ElectroChem, having a pin-type flow field with an active area of 25 cm2

• 1.8 V and 0.7 V were used for the charging and discharging steps, respectively. Between the charging and discharging, the cell was kept at an open-circuit voltage condition for 5 min. Long-term cycling measurements were carried out at a current density of 80 mA cm−2 with fresh electrolyte and fresh

Stationary beam full-field transmission helium ion microscopy using sub-50 keV He⁺: Projected images and intensity patterns

• Michael Mousley,
• Santhana Eswara,
• Olivier De Castro,
• Olivier Bouton,
• Nico Klingner,
• Christoph T. Koch,
• Gregor Hlawacek and
• Tom Wirtz

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1648–1657, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.160

• revealed that these samples charge significantly under He+ ion irradiation. The spot patterns obtained in the THIM experiments are explained as artefacts related to sample charging. The results presented here indicate that factors other than channeling, blocking and surface diffraction of ions have an

• impact on the final intensity distribution in the far field. Hence, the different processes contributing to the final intensities will need to be understood in order to decouple and study the relevant ion-beam scattering and deflection phenomena. Keywords: charging; helium ion microscopy; ion

• He+ ions. The observed differences in the He+ ion intensity distribution as well as unexpected spot patterns are discussed. The results suggest that information about the sample morphology can be extracted. The results also show that charging-related effects can significantly contribute to the final

Upcycling of polyurethane waste by mechanochemistry: synthesis of N-doped porous carbon materials for supercapacitor applications

• Christina Schneidermann,
• Pascal Otto,
• Desirée Leistenschneider,
• Sven Grätz,
• Claudia Eßbach and
• Lars Borchardt

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1618–1627, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.157

• introduced between charging and discharging. The gravimetric capacitance was calculated from the discharge curve via the following equation: with specific capacitance Cspec, cell voltage U corrected by IR drop, and carbon mass of both electrodes m (without binder). Upcycling approach consisting of high

Kelvin probe force microscopy work function characterization of transition metal oxide crystals under ongoing reduction and oxidation

• Dominik Wrana,
• Karol Cieślik,
• Wojciech Belza,
• Christian Rodenbücher,
• Krzysztof Szot and
• Franciszek Krok

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1596–1607, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.155

• reproducible Kelvin parabola with negative curvature for both structures. As up and down bias sweeps appear to follow the same curve, and there is no sign of charging or charge transfer. A comparative study of LC-AFM and KPFM of the TiO/SrTiO3 structure enables a clear distinction between two materials of

Rapid thermal annealing for high-quality ITO thin films deposited by radio-frequency magnetron sputtering

• Petronela Prepelita,
• Ionel Stavarache,
• Doina Craciun,
• Florin Garoi,
• Catalin Negrila,
• Beatrice Gabriela Sbarcea and
• Valentin Craciun

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1511–1522, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.149

• sputtered onto the sample surfaces prior to imaging and cross-sectional analysis to avoid electrostatic charging during the measurements. The elemental and chemical composition of the ITO thin films as well as the electronic state of the elements within the material were investigated by X-ray photoelectron

• spectroscopy (XPS) method. A SPECS spectrometer with a PHOIBOS RX 150 analyzer and a Specs XR–50 M source was operated with a monochromatic Al anode (hν = 1486.61 eV) at 300 W. The charging effect of the sample deposited onto the quartz substrate is compensated for with a Specs FG15/40 flood gun. The chemical

Flexible freestanding MoS₂-based composite paper for energy conversion and storage

• Florian Zoller,
• Jan Luxa,
• Thomas Bein,
• Dina Fattakhova-Rohlfing,
• Daniel Bouša and
• Zdeněk Sofer

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1488–1496, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.147

• paper for applications in supercapacitors (SCs). The capacitance was measured by a chronoamperometry technique in KCl solution (1 M) using different charging–discharging current densities (1–5 mA·cm−2) in a potential range determined by cyclic voltammetry (CV) shown in Supporting Information File 1

• electrode that comes into contact with the electrolyte solution S. The calculation was performed using equation: C = (2·I) / (S·U/t). The calculated values are summarized for each discharging current in Table 1. Charging–discharging curves of MoS2-based composite paper obtained using the chronoamperometry

• calomel reference electrode was used as the reference electrode and the measurements were performed in 1 M KCl solution. The exposed area was a disk with 0.94 mm diameter. In order to measure the charge–discharge curves, several charging–discharging currents (1–5 mA·cm−2) were used to charge the material

Hierarchically structured 3D carbon nanotube electrodes for electrocatalytic applications

• Pei Wang,
• Katarzyna Kulp and
• Michael Bron

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1475–1487, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.146

• displayed in Figure 7. The currents in the CVs are associated with the charging and decharging of the electrical double layer and denote the double-layer capacity, which can be regarded as an estimation of the surface area for the carbon-only samples. In addition to these currents, in the potential range

• scan rate of 5 mV s−1 was applied. Note that the oxidation current scales with the square root of the scan rate, while the double-layer charging current linearly scales with scan rate. Thus, the slow scan rate allows for a much more reliable determination of peak potentials and currents. The fifth

Fabrication of phase masks from amorphous carbon thin films for electron-beam shaping

• Lukas Grünewald,
• Dagmar Gerthsen and
• Simon Hettler

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1290–1302, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.128

• (transmission) electron microscopy (S(T)EM). Phase-modulating thin-film devices (phase masks) made of amorphous silicon nitride are commonly used to generate a wide range of different beam shapes. An additional conductive layer on such a device is required to avoid charging under electron-beam irradiation

• , which induces unwanted scattering events. Results: Phase masks of conductive amorphous carbon (aC) were successfully fabricated with optical lithography and focused ion beam milling. Analysis by TEM shows the successful generation of Bessel and vortex beams. No charging or degradation of the aC phase

• , smooth, free-standing SixNy thin films are commercially available. Smooth thin films are a requirement for the successful fabrication of the thickness pattern. However, SixNy is an insulator and an additional conductive layer has to be deposited onto a SixNy-based PM to avoid charging by electron-beam

Tailoring the stability/aggregation of one-dimensional TiO₂(B)/titanate nanowires using surfactants

• Atiđa Selmani,
• Johannes Lützenkirchen,
• Kristina Kučanda,
• Dario Dabić,
• Engelbert Redel,
• Ida Delač Marion,
• Damir Kralj,
• Darija Domazet Jurašin and
• Maja Dutour Sikirić

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1024–1037, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.103

• /DTAB and TNW/12-2-12 systems was investigated in order to determine the effect of the surfactants on the surface charging in the respective dispersions. The measured variations of the zeta potential with pH are shown in Figure 6a,b. The two lowest monomer concentrations of both surfactants shifted the

• equilibria, a surface complexation model (SCM) was designed based on the one previously used to describe TNW charging in the absence of surfactants [48]. Not many surface complexation models involving surfactant adsorption are available. A recent example in the work of Tagavifar et al. involves a purely

• diffuse double layer model [57]. Here, we use a more complex model. The surface complexation model starts from the previous model developed for the bare TNWs. These fundamental charging settings are given in the first three lines of Table 2. Based on this, the zeta potential measurements in the presence

Concurrent nanoscale surface etching and SnO₂ loading of carbon fibers for vanadium ion redox enhancement

• Jun Maruyama,
• Shohei Maruyama,
• Tomoko Fukuhara,
• Toru Nagaoka and
• Kei Hanafusa

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 985–992, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.99

• voltammograms (CVs) obtained in an acidic electrolyte without vanadium ions are shown in Figure 4. The current in the voltammogram is composed from three components, i.e., the electrochemical double-layer charging current at the carbon–electrolyte interface, and the faradaic currents due to the redox reactions

• of the surface functional groups and the carbon surface oxidation. The electrochemical double-layer charging yields a constant current and a rectangular CV shape. The current depends on the extent of the exposure of the basal and edge planes, the specific capacitances of which are 16 and 50–70 μF·cm

• with high-purity water before the incorporation. The anolyte (40 cm3) and catholyte (20 cm3) were prepared by electrolysis (charging) of 1 M VOSO4 + 2 M H2SO4 until the full conversion of VO2+ to VO2+ and V2+. After the electrolysis, half of the anolyte was removed and the pre-discharge was carried out

Novel reversibly switchable wettability of superhydrophobic–superhydrophilic surfaces induced by charge injection and heating

• Xiangdong Ye,
• Junwen Hou and
• Dongbao Cai

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 840–847, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.84

• . Influence of temperature on coating wettability To evaluate the effect of heating temperature on the coating wettability, the temperature was changed gradually while the voltage was kept at 2000 V and the charging time was kept at 2 min, and the results are shown in Figure 9. At room temperature, the

• the following: the increase of temperature will promote the thermal motion of the molecules in the solid, which in turn will help the charges inject into the solid surface during the process of electric field application. Effect of charging time on durability of superhydrophilicity When the charging

• time is too short, the coating wettability cannot change from its original state (superhydrophobic) to superhydrophilic. For example, at 2000 V and 150 °C, the contact angle of the coating changed from 150.5° to 40° after 1 min. Only when the charging time is increased, such as at 2 min, will the

An efficient electrode material for high performance solid-state hybrid supercapacitors based on a Cu/CuO/porous carbon nanofiber/TiO₂ hybrid composite

• Mamta Sham Lal,
• Thirugnanam Lavanya and
• Sundara Ramaprabhu

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 781–793, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.78

• triangular shape during the charging and discharging steps, indicating complete electric double layer behavior. The Cu/CuO/PCNF/TiO2 composite shows the long charge/discharge duration which results from the typical pseudo-capacitive performance of the TiO2 nanoparticles in the composite. The specific

Trapping polysulfide on two-dimensional molybdenum disulfide for Li–S batteries through phase selection with optimized binding

• Sha Dong,
• Xiaoli Sun and
• Zhiguo Wang

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 774–780, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.77

• ≤ 6), the final product of Li2S is formed upon discharging; and the charging process occurs through the reverse reactions [40]. The insulating nature of sulfur and the lithiation products (Li2S2 and Li2S), and the dissolution of higher-order Li2Sx (x = 4–8) are the main challenges in the application

On the transformation of “zincone”-like into porous ZnO thin films from sub-saturated plasma enhanced atomic layer deposition

• Alberto Perrotta,
• Julian Pilz,
• Stefan Pachmajer,
• Antonella Milella and
• Anna Maria Coclite

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 746–759, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.74

• charging was compensated using a dual beam charge neutralization, with a flux of low-energy electrons (ca. 1 eV) combined with positive Ar ions of very low energy (10 eV). Samples were sputter cleaned for 1 min with an Ar ion beam of 1 kV, 1 µA (raster size: 2 × 2 cm2). The acquired spectra were processed

• with CasaXPS software. The lattice O–Zn component of the O 1s spectrum was used as internal standard for charging correction and it was set to 529.8 eV [56]. Results and Discussion Optochemical characterization of the zincone-like layers Zincone-like layers were deposited by varying the plasma pulse

Review of time-resolved non-contact electrostatic force microscopy techniques with applications to ionic transport measurements

• Aaron Mascaro,
• Yoichi Miyahara,
• Tyler Enright,
• Omur E. Dagdeviren and
• Peter Grütter

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 617–633, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.62

• difference (which can be used to extract the local work function) [1] and local piezoelectric response [2], and dynamic properties such as the charging and decay times of photoexcited carriers [3][4][5][6], and local activation energies for ionic transport [7][8]. These measurements play a crucial role in

• build-up in the sample at the location of the AFM tip if an appropriate voltage is applied across the tip–sample gap. Measuring the resonance frequency shift as a function of time after the light is turned on/off then allows for the charging/discharging time to be directly acquired, revealing

• information about charge generation and transport in the sample. This was first performed by Krauss et al. who observed charging of photoexcited CdSe nanocrystals by direct frequency shift measurements after illumination [26]. The concept outlined above can be applied to measure ionic transport in ionic

Coexisting spin and Rabi oscillations at intermediate time regimes in electron transport through a photon cavity

• Vidar Gudmundsson,
• Hallmann Gestsson,
• Nzar Rauf Abdullah,
• Chi-Shung Tang,
• Andrei Manolescu and
• Valeriu Moldoveanu

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 606–616, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.61

• state. We notice that the mean photon number in the system only assumes a considerable value during the late charging regime from 100 ps to 0.6 μs, when radiative transitions assist in moving charge from the states in the bias window to the ground state of the system [9]. The steady-state photon number

A porous 3D-RGO@MWCNT hybrid material as Li–S battery cathode

• Yongguang Zhang,
• Jun Ren,
• Yan Zhao,
• Taizhe Tan,
• Fuxing Yin and
• Yichao Wang

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 514–521, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.52

• mAh·g−1. After 200 charging/discharge cycles, a capacity of 805 mAh·g−1 and a coulombic efficiency of 98% were maintained, implying the shuttle effect was greatly suppressed by the composite matrix. In addition, the S-3D-RGO@MWCNT composite also exhibits an excellent rate capability. Keywords: carbon

Widening of the electroactivity potential range by composite formation – capacitive properties of TiO₂/BiVO₄/PEDOT:PSS electrodes in contact with an aqueous electrolyte

• Konrad Trzciński,
• Mariusz Szkoda,
• Andrzej P. Nowak,
• Marcin Łapiński and
• Anna Lisowska-Oleksiak

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 483–493, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.49

• candidates for storage because of fast charging/discharging processes, relatively simple structures, easy large-scale production and high power densities [5]. It is crucial to look for electrochemically stable electrode materials that exhibit high specific capacitance and can be rapidly and reversibly

• rectangular shape of the cv curves is preserved for both low and high scan rates. Moreover, an almost linear relationship (R2 = 0.998) between scan rate and current density was obtained suggesting that prepared electrodes should not show a capacity drop as the current rate of charging/discharging increases

Advanced scanning probe lithography using anatase-to-rutile transition to create localized TiO₂ nanorods

• Julian Kalb,
• Vanessa Knittel and
• Lukas Schmidt-Mende

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 412–418, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.40

• growth observable at the breaking line. Nanorods growing around the breaking line might originate from anatase nanoparticles released during the breaking process. Besides surface roughening, charging is another candidate that could promote the growth on scratched regions. The tip causes a lot of friction

• charging by trapping of electrons from the electron beam in neutral traps such as OH groups [43]. However, this effect becomes significantly stronger with increasing beam intensity and remains for many days in a humid environment. Hence, it results more likely from electron-beam-induced surface smoothing

• [44][45] rather than from surface charging. The effect of the number of repetitions on the resulting structure is shown in Figure 4C. Even a single writing step (one scratch in forward and one in backward direction) is enough to obtain a clear contrast between the treated and the pristine sample

Transport signatures of an Andreev molecule in a quantum dot–superconductor–quantum dot setup

• Zoltán Scherübl,
• András Pályi and
• Szabolcs Csonka

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 363–378, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.36

• bound states (ABSs) [33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51] via local Andreev reflection (LAR). Due to the charging energy on the QDs, the QD–SC–QD geometry prefers CAR over the LAR and leads to the expectation that CAR hybridizes the states of the two QDs

Nanoporous water oxidation electrodes with a low loading of laser-deposited Ru/C exhibit enhanced corrosion stability

• Sandra Haschke,
• Dmitrii Pankin,
• Vladimir Mikhailovskii,
• Maïssa K. S. Barr,
• Adriana Both-Engel,
• Alina Manshina and
• Julien Bachmann

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 157–167, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.15

• system with a base pressure of 10−9 mbar. Adventitious carbon was removed from the surface by 1 min, 2 kV Ar+ ion sputtering. To prevent charging a combination of electron and ion neutralization was employed. The Ru 3d and O 1s XPS core level spectra were analyzed using a fitting routine which decomposes

Scanning probe microscopy for energy-related materials

• Rüdiger Berger,
• Benjamin Grévin,
• Philippe Leclère and
• Yi Zhang

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 132–134, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.12

• ongoing to address requirements of today and the future. These requirements are, for example, high power conversion efficiency, loss-free transport of energy, fast charging rates and high charging capacity. In order to fulfil these requirements, specific functional materials are being developed

Pull-off and friction forces of micropatterned elastomers on soft substrates: the effects of pattern length scale and stiffness

• Peter van Assenbergh,
• Marike Fokker,
• Julian Langowski,
• Jan van Esch,
• Marleen Kamperman and
• Dimitra Dodou

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 79–94, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.8