In situ fabrication of Ni–Co (oxy)hydroxide nanowire-supported nanoflake arrays and their application in supercapacitors

Abstract

Three-dimensional (3D) hybrid nanostructured arrays grown on a flexible substrate have recently attracted great attention owing to their potential application as supercapacitor electrodes in portable and wearable electronic devices. Here, we report an in situ conversion of Ni–Co active electrode materials for the fabrication of high-performance electrodes. Ni–Co carbonate hydroxide nanowire arrays on carbon cloth were initially synthesized via a hydrothermal method, and they were gradually converted to Ni–Co (oxy)hydroxide nanowire-supported nanoflake arrays after soaking in an alkaline solution. The evolution of the supercapacitor performance of the soaked electrode was investigated in detail. The areal capacitance increases from 281 mF cm⁻² at 1 mA cm⁻² to 3710 and 3900 mF cm⁻² after soaking for 36 h and 48 h, respectively. More interestingly, the electrode also shows an increased capacitance with charge/discharge cycles due to the long-time soaking in KOH solution, suggesting novel cycling durability. The enhancement in capacitive performance should be related to the formation of a unique nanowire-supported nanoflake array architecture, which controls the agglomeration of nanoflakes, making them fully activated. As a result, the facile in situ fabrication of the hybrid architectural design in this study provides a new approach to fabricate high-performance Ni/Co based hydroxide nanostructure arrays for next-generation energy storage devices.