Synthesis of an architectural electrode based on manganese oxide and carbon nanotubes for flexible supercapacitors

• A flexible electrode is prepared by electrophoretic deposition of CNTs on a GS.
• The γ-MnO2 nanoclusters are prepared by electrodeposition in low electrolyte concentration.
• They do not discrupt the carbon–carbon conductive connection in 3D CNT network.
• They also provide short diffusion path lengths due to layered nanoflakes.
• The electrode exhibits high specific capacitance and long-term cycle stability.

We report the synthesis of an architectural electrode by electrophoretic deposition of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) on a graphite sheet (GS) substrate, followed by electrodeposition of manganese oxide (MnO2) nanoclusters into a three-dimensional network structure of CNT to form MnO2 embedded-CNTs/GS. The novel architecture, in which disconnected MnO2 nanoclusters were embedded in an interconnected 3D CNT network, was beneficial to improve the electrochemical utilization of MnO2 for charge storage. Therefore, the MnO2 embedded-CNTs/GS showed a fairly high specific capacitance of 540.7 F/g (based on MnO2), an excellent rate capability and a good cycling stability (less 10% loss of its initial capacitance after 1000 cycles).