Pressurized Alloying Assisted Synthesis of High Quality Antimonene for Capacitive Deionization

Abstract

Mono‐elemental antimonene as a new member of the 2D material family has recently attracted huge attention, whereas the higher chemical activity and narrower interlayer gallery have impinged the quality of product upon exfoliation from the bulk counterpart. To overcome the intrinsic drawbacks, along with the line of the liquid‐phase exfoliation (LPE) method, here, a pressurized alloying approach introduces a Li3Sb alloy intermediate at the edge region of bulk β‐phase antimony by pre‐lithiation in the presence of n‐butyllithium and internal pressure is put forward. A protonation process converts the Li3Sb to gaseous stibine (SbH3) in a liquid solution, enabling an upward buoyancy together with the endothermic opening of the galleries that facilitate the subsequent LPE. As a result, the β‐phase antimony is efficiently exfoliated into antimonene nanosheets with perfect retention of basal plane texture (lateral size of ≈3 µm and thickness of less than 2 nm). Finally, the high‐quality antimonene being simply treated with HCl enables great Na+ diffusion along the basal plane to deliver excellent capacitive deionization performance with a salt adsorption capacity of 31.4 mg g–1 at an ultra‐low NaCl concentration (135 mg L–1).

Antimonene: a tuneable post-graphene material for advanced applications in optoelectronics, catalysis, energy and biomedicine

“…The resulting material consists of antimonene nanosheets with lateral dimensions of E3 mm and a thickness of o2 nm. 133 The ability to intercalate alkali metals shown by Sb allows the formation of antimony intercalation compounds to be envisioned, in analogy to previously reported black phosphorus intercalation compounds (BPICs), which under appropriate solvents and under thorough exclusion of oxygen and water may lead to pnictogenide dispersions. 61,[134][135][136] 3.2 Bottom-up approaches 3.2.1 Epitaxial growth.…”

“…The resulting material consists of antimonene nanosheets with lateral dimensions of ≈3 μm and a thickness of <2 nm. 133 …”

Advances in the synthesis and modification of two-dimensional antimonene

“…A press alloying method was designed and proposed by Yujie Gao et al in 2021. 46 The Li 3 Sb phase formed by antimony block and n -butyllithium at 80 °C reacts with water to form gaseous SbH 3 in a short time, which provides gaseous buoyancy for the system. This buoyancy can break the van der Waals force between the antimony layers, thereby realizing the antimony exfoliation.…”

Space‐Confined Metal Ion Strategy for Carbon Materials Derived from Cobalt Benzimidazole Frameworks with High Desalination Performance in Simulated Seawater

“…[29] It is highly important to develop highperformance electrode materials for CDI cells to realize efficient and fast desalination. [30,31] Therefore, the exploration of efficient CDI electrode materials has become a topic of research. [32,33] Carbon materials derived from ZIFs are among the most promising CDI electrode materials.…”