Synthesis of multilayer graphene balls on mesoporous Co-MCM-41 molecular sieves by chemical vapour deposition method

• Highly-ordered hexagonal Co-MCM-41 template was synthesized hydrothermally.
• Novel GBs with high degree of graphitization were synthesized on Co-MCM-41 by CVD.
• The synthesized GBs are of uniform diameter with average size of 50 nm.
• Catalytic template assisted CVD approach is a versatile and scalable technique.
• GBs make them suitable for application in future electronic devices and capacitors.

The virtuous structure of mesoporous Co-MCM-41 molecular sieve was synthesized hydrothermally, and was characterized by various physico-chemical techniques such as ICP-AES, XRD, N2 physisorption isotherms, FT-IR, TGA, SEM, and TEM. They were used as catalytic templates for the growth of graphene balls (GBs) by CVD method at different temperatures (850, 900, and 950 °C) using acetylene as a carbon precursor. The reaction temperature was optimized for the better formation of GBs. The synthesized novel carbon material was purified, and then systematically studied by XRD, TGA, SEM, HR-TEM and Raman spectroscopy techniques. The graphitic nature of material was confirmed by XRD analysis and Raman spectroscopy techniques. Thermal stability of GBs was above 600 °C under static condition and confirmed by TGA/DTG studies. The analytical results show that synthesized carbon materials had spherical structures with high degree of graphitization. The SEM and TEM image shows that the carbon materials exists in spherical morphology, and the diameter of these GBs are quite uniform and in a narrow range of 45–55 nm.

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