Ultralight Carbon Aerogels with Highly Hierarchical Porous Structures Synthesized from Sodium Alginate-Nanocellulose Composites for High-Performance Supercapacitors

作者：Jinran Cui, Yexin Dai, Shuo Xu, Pingping Zhang, Zhiyun Wang, Xianhua Liu · 发表于：Polymers · 年份：2025 · DOI：10.3390/polym17111544 · 被引用次数：10 · 研究领域：Supercapacitor Materials and Fabrication、Aerogels and thermal insulation、Electrospun Nanofibers in Biomedical Applications

Hierarchical porous carbon materials hold great potential for energy storage applications due to their high porosity, large specific surface area, and excellent electrical conductivity. Cellulose and sodium alginate are naturally abundant high-molecular-weight biopolymer materials. Utilizing them as precursors for the fabrication of high-performance electrochemical carbon materials is highly significant for achieving carbon neutrality goals. In this study, porous carbon aerogels were successfully synthesized using a combination of freeze-drying and a simple carbonization process, with nanocellulose and sodium alginate as precursors. Among the prepared samples, SC-0.03 (sodium alginate: nanocellulose = 0.1:0.03) exhibited the best performance, achieving a specific surface area of 713.7 m2 g−1. This material features an optimized hierarchical pore structure and a substantial intrinsic oxygen doping content, resulting in excellent capacitance performance. Benefiting from these structural advantages and their synergistic effects, the SC-0.03 electrode demonstrated a high specific capacitance of 251.5 F g−1 at a current density of 0.5 A g−1. This study shows that the construction of three-dimensional porous structures by taking advantage of the self-supporting properties of natural polymer materials does not require the introduction of external binders. Due to the nanoscale dimensions and high aspect ratio, nanocellulose enables the formation of a more refined and interconnected h...