Gaseous adsorption of carbon tetrachloride onto carbon nanofiber arrays prepared by template-assisted synthesis

Adsorption of carbon tetrachloride onto aligned carbon nanofiber (CNF) arrays, prepared by a template-assisted synthesis, in vapor phase is conducted in the present study. Porous structure analysis indicated that various pore size distributions of the CNF arrays are found to vary with their tubular sizes. The increasing tubular size is accompanied by a decreasing micropore fraction as well as a vapor-phase adsorption capacity. Freundlich and Dubinin–Radushkevich models were employed to analyze the equilibrium adsorption data. The surface accessibility of CNF arrays, i.e., adsorption capacity per surface area, was found to decrease with the pore size, according to these models. It is suggested on the basis of the present work that the micropore fraction of CNFs plays an important role in determining the adsorption coverage. Both the equilibrium constant and free energy for the vapor-phase adsorption increase with the micropore proportion, indicating that the micropores act as a high-energy site for adsorption of carbon tetrachloride.