Ultrafast room-temperature reduction of graphene oxide by sodium borohydride,sodium molybdate and hydrochloric acid

Since graphene-based materials have shown great potential in many fields, it is important to explore ultrafast and high-efficient methods to synthesize reduced graphene oxide (rGO) using inexpensive reducing agents under mild conditions. Here, we reported a novel method for the ultrafast chemical reduction of graphene oxide (GO) at room temperature using sodium borohydride (NaBH₄), sodium molybdate (Na₂MoO₄) and hydrochloric acid (HCl). The reduction was carried out within 2 min. A series of characterization results revealed that the obtained reduced graphene oxide has higher reduction degree than that synthesized by NaBH₄ alone at high temperature. Moreover, rGO electrode based on the present reducing method exhibited a superior specific capacitance of 139.8 F/g at a current density of 1 A/g, indicating that it can be used as electrode materials for supercapacitors.