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Synthesis of Carbon Nanohorns by Inductively Coupled Plasma

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Abstract

We demonstrate a new pathway for the synthesis of carbon nanohorns (CNHs) in a reactor by using inductively coupled plasma (ICP) and gaseous precursors. Thermal plasma synthesis allows the formation of different carbon allotropes such as carbon nanoflakes, hybrid forms of flakes and nanotubules, CNHs embryos, seed-like CNHs and onion-like polyhedral graphitic nanocapsules. In this study, pressure has the greatest impact on the selectivity of carbon nanostructures: pressure below 53.3 kPa favors the growth of carbon nanoflakes and higher pressures, 66.7 kPa and above, promotes the formation of CNHs. The ratio between methane and hydrogen as well as the global concentration of CH4 + H2 inside the plasma flame are also crucial to the reaction. CNHs are formed preferentially by injection of a 1:2 ratio of H2 to CH4 at 82.7 kPa with a production rate of 20 g/h. The synthesis pathway is easily scalable and could be made continuous, which offers an interesting alternative compared to methods based on laser-, arc- or induction-based vaporization of graphite rods.

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Acknowledgements

The Natural Sciences, Engineering Research Council, the Centre Québécois pour les Matériaux Fonctionnels (Fonds Nature et Technologie) and the Quebec Centre for Advanced Materials (QCAM) are acknowledged for funding this work. R.M. and N.B. acknowledge financial support from the Canada Research Chair programs. We thank Kossi Eyadéma Béré and André Bilodeau for their help during experiments. We would like to thank Charles Bertrand and Carl Saint-Louis from the Plateforme de Recherche et d’Analyse des Matériaux (PRAM) of Université de Sherbrooke for their help in the acquisition of data related to material characterization. We are very grateful to the MEANS team (Microscopie Electronique Avancée et Nano-Structures) of University of Paris, especially Guillaume Wang for helping us on the JEOL microscope.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Plasma, Process & Integrations of Nanomaterial (2PIN) Laboratory, Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnological Engineering, Université de Sherbrooke, 2500 Boulevard de l’Université, Sherbrooke, Québec, J1K 2R1, Canada

    Fanny Casteignau, Taki Aissou, Jocelyn Veilleux & Nadi Braidy

  2. Institut Interdisciplinaire d’Innovation Technologique (3IT), 3000 Boulevard Université, Sherbrooke, Québec, J1K 0A5, Canada

    Fanny Casteignau & Nadi Braidy

  3. Département de Génie Physique, Polytechnique Montréal, 2500 Chemin de Polytechnique, Montréal, Québec, H3T 1J4, Canada

    Charlotte Allard

  4. Laboratoire Matériaux et Phénomènes Quantiques, Université de Paris, UMR 7162, 75013, Paris, France

    Christian Ricolleau

  5. Département de Chimie, Université de Montréal, Succ. Centre-Ville, C. P. 6128, Montréal, Québec, H3C 1J7, Canada

    Richard Martel

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  1. Fanny Casteignau
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Casteignau, F., Aissou, T., Allard, C. et al. Synthesis of Carbon Nanohorns by Inductively Coupled Plasma. Plasma Chem Plasma Process 42, 465–481 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11090-022-10240-8

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