Peng, Juan and Gao, Wei and Gupta, Bipin Kumar and Liu, Zheng and Romero-Aburto , Rebeca and Ge, Liehui and Song, Li and Alemany, Lawrence B. and Zhan, Xiaobo and Gao, Guanhui and Vithayathil, Sajna Antony and Kaipparettu, Benny Abraham and Marti, Angel A. and Hayashi, Takuya and Zhu, Jun-Jie and Ajayan, Pulickel M. (2018) Graphene Quantum Dots Derived from Carbon Fibers. Nano Letters, 12 (2). pp. 844-849. ISSN 1530-6984

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Abstract

Graphene quantum dots (GQDs), which are edge-bound nanometer-size graphene pieces, have fascinating optical and electronic properties. These have been synthesized either by nanolithography or from starting materials such as graphene oxide (GO) by the chemical breakdown of their extended planar structure, both of which are multistep tedious processes. Here, we report that during the acid treatment and chemical exfoliation of traditional pitch-based carbon fibers, that are both cheap and commercially available, the stacked graphitic submicrometer domains of the fibers are easily broken down, leading to the creation of GQDs with different size distribution in scalable amounts. The as-produced GQDs, in the size range of 1-4 nm, show two-dimensional morphology, most of which present zigzag edge structure, and are 1-3 atomic layers thick. The photoluminescence of the GQDs can be tailored through varying the size of the GQDs by changing process parameters. Due to the luminescence stability, nanosecond lifetime, biocompatibility, low toxicity, and high water solubility, these GQDs are demonstrated to be excellent probes for high contrast bioimaging and biosensing applications.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	Copyright for this article belongs to M/s American Chemical Society.
Subjects:	Chemistry > Physical Chemistry Materials Science Applied Physics/Condensed Matter Nanoscience/ Nanotechnology
Divisions:	UNSPECIFIED
Depositing User:	Mr. Yogesh Joshi
Date Deposited:	22 Aug 2019 11:03
Last Modified:	22 Aug 2019 11:03
URI:	http://npl.csircentral.net/id/eprint/4051

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