Carbon cloth-MnO2 nanotube composite for flexible supercapacitor

Three-dimensional MnO2 nanorods were synthesized on a carbon cloth (CC) via hydrothermal method to fabricate binder-free electrode for flexible supercapacitor application. The fabricated MnO2/CC electrode exhibits specific capacitance of 487Fg(-1) at current density of 2Ag(-1) in conventional three electrode system using 1 M Na2SO4 electrolyte. Furthermore, a flexible symmetric supercapacitor is assembled using 1M Na2SO4 electrolyte which shows maximum specific capacitance of 232Fg(-1) at current density of 0.5Ag(-1). The supercapacitor exhibits specific energy up to 5.18Whkg(-1) and specific power of 242Wkg(-1) at 0.5 and 1.0 Ag-1, respectively. Furthermore, the supercapacitor exhibits specific capacitance retention of 91.7% over 1000 charging discharging cycles. The attractive performance suggests that MnO2/CC supercapacitor has potential application for energy storage.