Reducing agent free synthesis of graphene from graphene oxide

Abstract

Graphene is synthesized by microwave irradiation (MWI) of graphene oxide (GO) and subsequent sonication. MWI of GO is carried in a household microwave oven without using any reducing agents. Sonication of microwave irradiated GO is carried out in distilled water using a probe type sonicator. This method does not evolve any unsafe by-product gases which is otherwise the case when reducing agents are used in the reduction of GO to graphene. Moreover, due to its intrinsic nature, the method is scalable and cost effective. The synthesized product has been characterized as graphene using micro Raman scattering, x-ray diffraction and electron diffraction. Diffraction results show that the synthesized graphene is highly oriented.