Synthesis and characterization of bimodal rod-like mesoporous carbons from raffinose by SBA-15 templates

Mesoporous carbons with bimodal rod-like pore structures and tunable pore sizes from 3.66 to 5.42 nm were for the first time obtained by employing SBA-15 as templates and raffinose as carbon precursors. Small angle X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, N₂ sorption analysis, and Raman spectroscopy were used to determine the textural properties of the resulting materials. Bimodal frameworks with mesopores (4–5 nm) as well as macropores (125–130 nm) were achieved. The mesoporous carbons lost its ordered structure from the templates due to mesostructural shrinkage and collapse of mesopores, which resulted in partial duplicate of the template and pore-widening effect (meso to macropores). With the increasing of carbonization temperature from 500, 700 to 900 °C, the textural parameters such as specific surface areas, pore volumes, and mean pore diameters all increased significantly. In the temperature range studied, higher carbonization temperature would generate much more abundant porosity. The ratio of I _D to I _G (I _D/I _G) indicated a rather low crystallinity with the varying of aging temperature and the carbonization temperatures. The advantage of the procedure was that no acid or other chemical catalysts were involved during the infiltration and carbon formation process.