Electrochemical preparation of nitrogen-doped graphene quantum dots and their size-dependent electrocatalytic activity for oxygen reduction

Here we report a remarkable transformation of nitrogen-doped multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) to size selective nitrogen-doped graphene quantum dots (N-GQDs) by a two-step electrochemical method. The sizes of the N-GQDs strongly depend on the applied anodic potential, moreover increasing potential resulted in a smaller size of N-GQDs. These N-GQDs display many unusual size-dependant optoelectronic (blue emission) and electrocatalytic (oxygen reduction) properties. The presence of N dopants in the carbon framework not only causes faster unzipping of MWCNTs but also provides more low activation energy site for enhancing the electrocatalytic activity for technologically daunting reactions like oxygen reduction. The smaller size of N-GQDs has shown better performance as compared to the large N-GQDs. Interestingly, N-GQDs-3 (size = 2.5±0.3 nm, onset potential = 0.75 V) show a 30-mV higher positive onset potential shift compared to that of N-GQDs-2 (size = 4.7±0.3 nm, onset potential = 0.72 V) and 70 mV than that of N-GQDs-1 (size = 7.2±0.3, onset potential = 0.68 V) for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) in a liquid phase. These result in the size-dependent electrocatalytic activity of N-GQDs for ORR as illustrated by the smaller sized N-GQDs (2.5±0.3 nm) undoubtedly promising metal-free electrocatalysts for fuel cell applications.