Low temperature solvothermal synthesis of crumpled carbon nanosheets Original Research Article

Crumpled carbon nanosheets have been successfully synthesized via a catalyst-free solvothermal route at very low temperatures (60–100 °C), using tetrachloromethane as the carbon source and potassium as the reductant. The X-ray powder diffraction pattern indicates that the products are hexagonal graphite. Transmission and scanning electron microscopy show that the thickness of crumpled carbon nanosheets ranges from 3 to 8 nm. Raman spectroscopy supports the existence of graphitized carbon at the nanoscale. BET experiments show that carbon nanosheets have a large surface area. Compared with previous methods to prepare graphite nanosheets, such a low reaction temperature has attractive advantages.