Synthesis of carbon nano-onions doped with nitrogen using spray pyrolisis

In this work, we have synthesized carbon nano-onions (CNOs) doped with nitrogen and iron carbide core. These nanostructures were synthesized pyrolysing various alcohol-benzylamine reaction mixtures. These CNOs showed a certain degree of functionalization of their surfaces, depending of the solvent, as well as n-type doping due to the inclusion of N atoms in the graphene layers. Ratios of O atoms to C atoms as well as to N atoms of the pyrolyzed solution play an important role in the morphology of the CNOs and on the phase of the iron core. Differences in the morphology of the samples have an important effect on their electrical conductivity as well as in their electrochemical properties. Synthesized samples showing well-defined CNOs, the sintering between them is negligible, have a low conductivity and higher capacitance, while those samples showing the best conductivities and lower capacitances, the CNOs in samples are connected between them by turbostratic graphite ribbons, in similar way to the CNOs synthesized from carbon nanodiamond annealed in argon atmosphere. (C) 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.