Hollow Carbon Nanospheres with Developed Porous Structureand Retained N Doping for Facilitated Electrochemical Energy Storage

Development of highly porous carbons with abundant surface functionalities and well-defined nanostructure is of significance for many important electrochemical energy storage systems. However, porous carbons suffer from a compromise between porosity, doped functionality, and nanostructure that have thus far restricted their performances. Here, we report the design of highly porous, nitrogen-enriched hollow carbon nanospheres (PN-HCNs) by an interfacial copolymerization strategy followed by NH3-assisted carbonization, and further demonstrate their significance and effectiveness in enhancing the electrochemical performances. The PN-HCN simultaneously delivers a large surface area (1237 m2 g–1) and high N functionalities (6.25 atom %) with a remarkable efficiency of the surface area increase to N loss ratio enabled by NH3 treatment while inheriting the hollow nanospherical structure. Accordingly, owing to the enhanced surface area and retained N doping, the prepared PN-HCN demonstrates outstanding electroche...