Borophene as an additive for high temperature solar absorbers coatings
Since the discovery of graphene, there has been an interest for a new, single-layered, so called »2D materials«. Among these materials is also borophene, which gained attention due to its unique chemical and mechanical properties. It holds promise for usage in various applications. One of those applications could be high temperature solar absorbers.
The aims of my thesis were to synthesis lithium-boron alloy and characterize lamellar boron obtained from synthesized alloy. We started with the synthesis of lithium-boron alloy in a dry box with argon atmosphere – »Glove box «. After the synthesis we removed lithium by treating it with water and then filtered the suspension so we could obtain pure boron. The samples were additionally cleaned with hydrochloric acid. We tried to exfoliate boron, as much as possible, with an ultrasonic processor. Later on the sonication samples were characterized with scanning electron microscopy (SEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM), BET analysis, and a thermal analysis combined with mass spectrometric analysis.
The results of SEM, before the exfoliation, revealed us we had synthesized boron with lamellar microstructure. After the sonication under various conditions, SEM images proved our success in exfoliation. With the AFM, we found out that the thickness of our sample was 188nm and with the BET analysis that the specific surface area of our sample was 3,59m^2/g. The results of thermal analysis combined with the mass spectrometric analysis showed that our sample is stable in an inert atmosphere, but in an oxygen atmosphere only up to 590°C.
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