Ultrathin carbon film from carbonization of spin-cast polyacrylonitrile film

Towards scalable fabrication of ultrasmooth and porous thin carbon films

“…PAN is reported to be soluble in a limited number of solvents such as DMF, DMSO, and dimethylacetamide [2,30]. These solvents possess very high boiling point (low evaporation rate) and are highly hygroscopic.…”

“…These solvents possess very high boiling point (low evaporation rate) and are highly hygroscopic. Therefore, PAN thin films are generally produced through the spin-coating process with strict control of the manufacturing parameters, including temperature, humidity, and the spin speed [2,18,19].…”

“…Solid amorphous carbon films have been shown to be technologically important as semi-transparent and abrasion-resistant coatings [1,2]. The crystalline (graphite) and glassy carbon films are also commonly used as solid lubricants to decrease sliding friction, wear rates, and/or corrosion under conditions where the utilization of liquid lubricants are neither possible nor desirable [3,4].…”

“…In fact, for carbon films prepared by pyrolysis of polymer precursors very rough surface was reported [18,19]. On the other hand, a recent study on carbonization of polyacrylonitrile (PAN) film deposited on flat substrate by spin-coating in a well-controlled environment reported on fabrication of smoother solid carbon films with roughness between 4 and 15 nm [2].…”

Characteristics of a high compressive strength graphite foam prepared from pitches using a PVA–AAc solution

“…where d 0 0 2 is the graphite interlayer spacing, l is the X-ray wavelength (1.5406 Å ), L c is the average crystalline thickness, b is the full width-half maximum of the (0 0 2) peak, and u is Bragg's angle [25][26][27][28][29]. The interlayer spacing and crystal structures, as described by d 0 0 2 and g, of the graphite foams that were prepared using the hydrogel template at various slurry concentrations were obtained from the XRD patterns shown in Fig.…”