The role of anthraquinone sulfonate dopants in promoting performance of polypyrrole composites as pseudo-capacitive electrode materials

We report the role of anthraquinone sulfonate dopants in promoting performance of electro-synthesized polypyrrole (PPy) composites for use in electrochemical supercapacitors. The incorporation of anthraquinone sulfonate species into the polymer matrix can significantly improve the surface area of PPy composites that are composed of submicron-/nano-sized particles, as evidenced from scanning electron microscopy (SEM) results. Cyclic voltammetry and galvanostatic charge–discharge measurements in 1 M KCl solution reveal that these dopants result in an improved specific capacitance, a wide working potential range and enhanced long-cycle stability as compared to ClO4− dopant. Among the samples investigated, the resulting PPy/AQS (9,10-anthraquinone-2-sulfonic acid sodium salt) composite exhibits the highest specific capacitance of 608 F g−1 at a scan rate of 5 mV s−1 within a potential range between −0.9 and 0.5 V (vs. saturated calomel electrode, SCE).