Chemical surface modification of graphene oxide by femtosecond laser pulse irradiation in aqueous suspensions

Reduction of graphene oxide (GO) by femtosecond laser pulse irradiation of an aqueous suspension was studied. Different laser parameters such as laser fluence and irradiation time were scanned to obtain the optimum reduced graphene oxide (rGO) with fewer defect sites and lower electrical resistivity. The fabricated rGO samples were characterized using several techniques such as X-ray diffraction, UV–Visible absorption spectrometry, Raman spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and others. The XRD profiles of rGO revealed that the interplanar spacing between carbon layers significantly decreased to 3.51 Å, which is close to that of pristine graphite. Furthermore, the intensity ratio of D and G bands of rGO measured by Raman spectroscopy was more than 20 % smaller than that of GO, indicating the enhancement of sp² domains. It is noted that the defect sites and the disorder carbon double bond networks on the basal graphene plane were relatively decreased after reduction. In addition, the electrical resistivity of rGO significantly decreased to 3.3 Ω·cm under the optimum condition. From these results, femtosecond laser can be used as a suitable tool for GO reduction because it is a simple, controllable, and flexible method for getting highly reduced graphene oxide.