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Synthesis of graphene quantum dots for their supramolecular polymorphic architectures

Nano Research volume 14, pages 1228–1231 (2021)Cite this article

Abstract

How to regulate the supramolecular structures in the assembly of graphene quantum dots (GQDs) is still a great challenge to be overcome. Herein, the GQDs of 1–3 layers with high quality are synthesized from the new precursor m-trihydroxybenzene in a green method. More importantly, a strategy for designing the supramolecular structures of GQDs is demonstrated, and the novel supramolecular morphologies of GQDs have been constructed for the first time. Moreover, the supramolecular morphologies of GQDs can be well controlled by regulating the preparation conditions, and the formation mechanism of the branch-like supramolecular structure has been explained by the the diffusion-limited aggregation (DLA) model. This work not only develops a new precoursor to synthesize GQDs, but also opens up an effective route to form the polymorphic supermolecules, thus greatly facilitating their potential applications.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the supports for the work from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21805166), the 111 Project of Hubei Province (No. D20015), and Foundation of Science and Technology Bureau of Yichang City (No. A18-302-a07).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Inorganic Nonmetallic Crystalline and Energy Conversion Materials, College of Materials and Chemical Engineering, China Three Gorges University, Yichang, 443002, China

    Weifeng Chen, Guo Lv, Qiyun Zhou, Jialu Shen, Jie Cao, Xiang Liu & Zhongxu Dai

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  1. Weifeng Chen
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  2. Guo Lv
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  3. Qiyun Zhou
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  4. Jialu Shen
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  5. Jie Cao
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  6. Xiang Liu
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  7. Zhongxu Dai
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Correspondence to Xiang Liu or Zhongxu Dai.

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The authors declare that they have no competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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Chen, W., Lv, G., Zhou, Q. et al. Synthesis of graphene quantum dots for their supramolecular polymorphic architectures. Nano Res. 14, 1228–1231 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-020-3236-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-020-3236-4

Keywords

  • graphene quantum dots
  • supermolecule
  • m-trihydroxybenzene
  • synthesis
  • the diffusion-limited aggregation