Method of manufacturing nanoporous graphene membrane

Abstract

One aspect of the disclosed is to provide a method of manufacturing a nanoporous multilayer graphene membrane, including a first step of oxidizing a surface of a multilayer graphene membrane, a second step of reducing the oxidized surface of the multilayer graphene to carry out reductive etching such that oxidized carbon atoms on the surface are naturally and randomly dispersed, and a third step of repeatedly performing a series of the first and the second steps until nanopores penetrating the multilayer graphene are formed.

Claims

1. A method of manufacturing a porous graphene membrane, comprising: a first step of oxidizing a surface of multilayer graphene, wherein the multilayer graphene is placed under an environment with oxygen-based radicals for oxidation of the surface of multilayer graphene, and the surface of multilayer graphene is oxidized in a randomly dispersed form by lowering an oxidation amount so as not to completely oxidize the entire surface; a second step of reducing the oxidized surface of the multilayer graphene to carry out reductive etching of oxidized carbon atoms in a randomly dispersed form; and a third step of repeatedly performing a series of the first and the second steps at least twice until nanopores having diameter of 0.4 to 100 nm are formed in the multilayer graphene, wherein the number of repetitions is adjusted until nanopores penetrating the multilayer graphene are formed.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the multilayer graphene consists of 10 layers or less.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the multilayer graphene has a polycrystalline form.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the oxygen-based radical is at least any one selected from the group consisting of an O radical, an O.sub.2 radical, an O.sub.3 radical (ozone), a OH radical, and a combination thereof.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the nanopores penetrating the multilayer graphene have an average diameter of less than 10 nm when viewed in a direction perpendicular to a graphene face.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein, in the third step, the number of repetitions is adjusted to a time point at which the nanopores are formed in a first layer of the multilayer graphene and the nanopores are not formed in a second layer of the multilayer graphene.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising: a process of passivating a broken binding part of edge carbon atoms, which is formed by the reductive etching of the second step, if returning from the second step to the first step for a repeated process of the third step.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein, in the first and second steps, oxidative and reductive etching processes are carried out on only a surface multilayer graphene.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein, in the first and second steps, oxidative and reductive etching processes are carried out on both surfaces of multilayer graphene.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising: a step of clustering epoxy functional groups or hydroxyl functional groups formed by oxidation on a graphene surface through an annealing process between the first step and the second step.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein processes of the first step to the third step are carried out after preliminarily attaching the multilayer graphene on a perforated support.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising: a step of removing oxidation-related chemical functional groups remaining on a graphene surface after finally obtaining a nanoporous multilayer graphene membrane.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein, in the second step, multilayer graphene is heated by microwaves for reductive etching.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein an average particle size of the multilayer graphene to be heated by microwaves is 0.5 mm or more when the multilayer graphene has a polycrystalline form.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein, in the second step, laser irradiation is applied to the surface of multilayer graphene for reductive etching.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the laser used for irradiation is pulsed laser.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

(1) The above and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art by describing in detail exemplary embodiments thereof with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

(2) FIG. 1 are molecular dynamics simulation results showing that when carbon atoms which are oxidized at the surface of graphene which is oxidized with high dispersion at a size of 10 nanometers or less receive sufficient energy (in order to shorten the calculation time, rapid heating was applied at a temperature of 3,000 K for the sake of convenience, but in actual heating, the temperature should be lower than 3,000 K to prevent the burning of graphene. When a method of transferring momentarily strong energy to a surface is used, which is similar to ultrashort pulsed laser irradiation, an effect of raising the temperature while preventing the burning of graphene can be imparted), the oxidized carbon atoms are reductively etched to form pores, irrespective of which layer (upper or lower layer) the oxidized carbon atoms are in. For the sake of convenience, the calculation was performed for two-layer graphene, but the same application is possible for multilayer graphene with two or more layers. In this figure, red is an oxygen atom, grey is a carbon atom in the upper layer, and blue is a carbon atom in the lower layer. The left figure shows the initial structure of oxidized graphene, and the right figure shows the structure of the graphene which has been reductively etched;

(3) FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram showing that nanopores can be formed in multilayer graphene even when oxidation-reduction processes in which etching is significantly suppressed are used when the processes are repeatedly performed (note that during a reduction process, a part in which only oxygen atoms are removed without etching of carbon atoms is much greater than a part in which oxygen atoms are removed with carbon atoms). Red is an oxygen atom, grey is a carbon atom in the upper layer, blue is a carbon atom in the lower layer, and steps that are represented in pink and yellow green indicate an oxidation process and a reduction process, respectively;

(4) FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram exemplarily illustrating a process (see the lower figure) in which a multilayer graphene nanoporous membrane is manufactured according to the method (see the upper left figure) of an embodiment of efficient reductive etching, and a multilayer graphene nanoporous membrane (see the upper right figure) which is finally manufactured (assuming that all of the remaining oxygen atoms have been removed). Red is an oxygen atom, grey is a carbon atom in the upper layer, blue is a carbon atom in the lower layer, and steps that are represented in pink and yellow green indicate an oxidation process and a reduction process, respectively;

(5) FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram showing that since the grain boundaries of the adjacent upper and lower layers in a multilayer graphene membrane are slightly misaligned with each other, buffering protection is possible between the layers even if granular etching actively occurs;

(6) FIGS. 5A and 5B are a schematic diagram illustrating a seawater desalination process through a one-layer nanoporous graphene membrane, and a schematic diagram illustrating a seawater desalination process through a four-layer nanoporous graphene membrane, respectively (10: sodium ion, 20: chlorine ion, and 30: water molecule); and

(7) FIGS. 6A to 6D each show changes in the permeation amount of water of one-layer to four-layer nanoporous graphene membranes over time, respectively, which are obtained by the molecular dynamics stimulation method (for the amount of applied pressure, values of several orders of magnitude higher than those of conventionally applied pressures in practice were used to shorten the calculation time).

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXEMPLARY EMBODIMENTS

(8) Hereinafter, the technical features of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying figures so that those of ordinary skill in the art to which the present invention pertains can easily understand the present invention.

(9) The terms and words used in the present specification and the claims described below should not be construed to be limited to ordinary or dictionary meanings, and based on the principle that the inventor may suitably define the concept of terms in order to describe his or her invention in the best way, it should be construed as meanings and concepts consistent with the technical idea of the present invention. Therefore, since the exemplary embodiments described in the present specification and the configurations shown in the drawings are only preferred exemplary embodiments of the present invention and are not intended to represent all of the technical ideas of the present invention, it should be understood that various equivalents and modification examples are possible.

(10) A method of manufacturing a nanoporous graphene membrane according to an embodiment of the present invention may include a first step of oxidizing a surface of multilayer graphene (conventionally, 10 layers or less), a second step of reducing the oxidized surface of the multilayer graphene to carry out reductive etching of oxidized carbon atoms in a randomly-dispersed form, and a third step of repeatedly performing the first and the second steps at least twice until nanopores are formed in the multilayer graphene membrane.

(11) As an example, in the first step, while the surface of multilayer graphene is oxidized, the oxidation amount may be adjusted so that the entire surface is not completely oxidized, thereby oxidizing the surface in a randomly dispersed form.

(12) As an example, in the second step, reductive etching of carbon atoms may occur together with a reduction reaction in which only oxygen atoms are removed from the surface while carbon atoms are not removed.

(13) As an example, the multilayer graphene membrane may have a polycrystalline form.

(14) As an example, for the reductive etching of carbon atoms on the oxidized surface in the second step, laser irradiation may be applied to the surface.

(15) As an example, pulsed laser may be used for the laser irradiation.

(16) As an example, the laser irradiation with pulsed laser may be carried out by applying a laser pulse having a width of 35 to 100 femtoseconds at an intensity of 20 to 50 watts/cm.sup.2 and a repetition rate of approximately 1 kHz for 1 to 3 minutes.

(17) As an example, for the reductive etching of carbon atoms of the oxidized surface in the second step, multilayer graphene with the oxidized surface may be placed in a microwave oven for application of microwaves.

(18) As an example, when the multilayer graphene to be heated by applying the microwaves has a polycrystalline form, the average particle size of the multilayer graphene may be greater than 0.5 mm or more.

(19) As an example, for heating with the microwaves, microwaves at 1,200 watts may be applied to multilayer graphene with the oxidized surface for 40 to 180 seconds.

(20) As an example, when the multilayer graphene membrane is a single-crystal material for the microwave heating, the multilayer graphene membrane may be placed in a quartz tube filled with argon gas to apply microwaves.

(21) As an example, between the first and second steps of the process, a step of annealing oxidized graphene at a temperature which is lower than the temperature at which reductive etching occurs and higher than room temperature to cluster (Nature Chem. Vol. 6, 151, 2014) epoxy groups or hydroxyl groups on a graphene surface to a desired level may be further included.

(22) As an example, after preliminarily carrying out a process of transferring a multilayer graphene membrane on a perforated board to be used as a separation membrane support, the first and second steps may be repeatedly performed.

(23) In the first step, multilayer graphene may be placed under an environment with oxygen-based radicals for oxidation of the surface of a multilayer graphene membrane.

(24) As an example, in the first step, at least any one substance selected from the group consisting of an O radical, an O.sub.2 radical, an O.sub.3 radical (ozone), a OH radical, and a combination thereof may be injected into a reactor in which multilayer graphene is placed to entirely or partly oxidize the surface of multilayer graphene by adjusting concentration, time, or the like.

(25) As an example, in the first step, for the oxidation of a multilayer graphene membrane, after placing multilayer graphene into a chamber under a vacuum state at 0.08 Torr, oxygen plasma may be generated by flowing 30 sccm (standard cubic centimeters per minute) of oxygen gas under radio frequency (RF) electromagnetic waves at 50 kHz and 70 watts.

(26) As an example, in the second step, a chemical substance may be used as a reducing agent for reductive etching.

(27) As an example, after the second step, a step of exhausting reductively etched substances may be further included.

(28) As an example, in the process, a step of removing oxygen atoms remaining on a membrane through a chemical reduction process or the like after finally obtaining a multilayer graphene membrane in which nanopores are formed may be further included.

(29) As an example, in the third step, the number of repetitions may be adjusted until nanopores penetrating the multilayer graphene are formed.

(30) As an example, in addition to adjusting the number of repetitions of performing a series of the first and the second steps until nanopores penetrating multilayer graphene are formed in the third step, a case in which repeated performing is stopped at a time point at which nanopores are formed in the upper layers of multilayer graphene and pores are not formed in the lower layers may be included.

(31) An oxidation process and a reductive etching process during the first and second steps may be carried out for only one among the upper and lower surfaces of multilayer graphene.

(32) An oxidation process and a reductive etching process during the first and second steps may be carried out for all of the upper and lower surfaces of multilayer graphene.

(33) As an example, for the repeated process, a process of passivating a broken binding part of edge carbon atoms, which is formed by reductive etching of the second step, in the course of returning from the second step to the first step may be further included.

(34) A large-area nanoporous graphene membrane can be manufactured by using the manufacturing method according to an embodiment of the present invention, and obtained nanoporous multilayer graphene membranes can be applied to ion separation, seawater desalination, and the like. FIG. 5A is a schematic diagram illustrating a seawater desalination process through a single-layer nanoporous graphene membrane, and FIG. 5B is a schematic diagram illustrating a seawater desalination process through a four-layer nanoporous graphene membrane. FIGS. 6A to 6D show the results of computer simulation of changes in the water permeation amount of a single-layer to four-layer nanoporous graphene membrane over time, respectively, and from these results, even if the number of the layers of graphene membranes increases from one to four, it can be seen that the graphene membranes exhibit similar water permeability performance.

(35) For the sake of convenience in the calculation, the number of nanopores per unit area of the nanoporous graphene membrane is set to be 1 per 851.6 angstrom.sup.2 and the diameter of the nanopores is set to be approximately 1 nm, but the actual pore density may be lower. In addition, in order to reduce calculation time, computer simulation was carried out by setting (it is possible to compute the permeation amount in proportion to pressure) a pressure applied to graphene membranes to each of 100, 150, and 200 MPa, but the actual pressure may be several orders of magnitude lower in MPa.

(36) Since a multilayer graphene membrane consists of several layers of graphene, an effect in which the size of pores formed during repeated oxidation and reduction processes may be irregular due to intrinsic structural defects that may be present on a graphene layer is not significant, whereas the effect may be critical for single-layer graphene. In particular, a large-area single-layer graphene membrane inevitably has a polycrystalline form, and as a result, it is difficult to form pores of even-sized pores in graphene due to the presence of a grain boundary during a reductive etching process. On the other hand, since the positions of grain boundaries are misaligned with each other depending on layers in a large-area multilayer graphene membrane, it is possible for mutual protection and buffering between the layers to solve a problem of excessive etching of grain boundaries that may be exhibited in large-area single-layer graphene (FIG. 4). In addition, since a problem of wrinkles is markedly insignificant for a nanoporous multilayer graphene membrane compared to a single-layer graphene membrane, the nanoporous multilayer graphene membrane is advantageous in terms of processability.

(37) Compared to a patterning-based etching technique using masks which require complex processes and equipment, the manufacturing method devised in the present invention can manufacture a nanoporous membrane having pores at an average diameter of several tens of nanometers or less by a simple process at a low cost (FIGS. 2 and 3). In addition, the formation of nanopores having a diameter of several nanometers or several subnanometers, which cannot be achieved by the patterning-based etching technique, is possible because of using a fine etching phenomenon at an atomic level that occurs during reduction.

(38) Since process steps of oxidative and reductive etching are separated in the present invention, the size of pores can be significantly reduced as compared to the formation of pores due to continuous oxygen radical attacks in conventional graphene membranes, and a problem caused by a high etching rate of intrinsic structural defects can be mitigated. In addition, since a graphene membrane on the upper layer of multilayer graphene functions to protect adsorption etching of a graphene membrane on the lower layer during a reductive etching process, the maximum size of formed pores is reduced compared to single-layer graphene, and an effect of the more uniform size distribution of pores can be achieved. A large-area nanoporous graphene membrane produced using the above method can be effectively used in various fields such as gas and ion separation, seawater desalination (FIGS. 5 and 6), and the like.

(39) The present invention is not limited to the above-described exemplary embodiments and the accompanying drawings, but is intended to be limited only by the appended claims. Therefore, it should be understood that substitutions, modifications, and changes in various forms can be made by those of ordinary skill in the art without departing from the technical idea of the present invention as defined in the appended claims, which may also be included within the scope of the present invention.