Introduction to graphene aerogel

1. AEROGEL: Ultralight
 - Application: energy storage, supercapacitors, adsorption, catalysis supports, and gas sensors
 - Graphene: extraordinary electron mobility, high surface area, good thermal conductivity and mechanical properties

One efficient approach to assemble graphene sheets into 3D bulk objects is to prepare them as aerogels or foams

2. GRAPHENE PREPARATION: chemical doping is another feasible way to functionalize and tune the properties of assembled graphene
 - Incorporating heteroatoms such as nitrogen into graphene can improve and modulate its physicochemical characteristics, especially its electrochemical performance

 Most nitrogen doped graphene is commonly prepared using chemical vapor deposition, pyrolysis of a nitrogen-containing precursor such as polyaniline or polypyrrole, nitrogen-plasma treatments of graphene and thermal annealing with ammonia or pyrrole

 + Advantage of the method: successfully anchor nitrogen atoms onto the graphene nanosheets => increase their electrocatalytic activity by providing more active sites
 + Disadvantage: require toxic gas precursors, or a large well-ordered template => it is desirable to develop a template-free and low-cost  [to obtain multifunctional, macroscopic nitrogen doped graphene architecture]