On-chip carbide derived carbon films for high performance micro-supercapacitors

The integration of high performance energy storage systems on silicon chips is necessary to support the development of portable electronic devices. Electrochemical double layer capacitors (or supercapacitors) are a good candidate for this purpose as they provide high power densities and long cycle life. Nevertheless, the improvement of the energy densities delivered by supercapacitors is required. High areal and volumetric capacitance values could be reached while using carbide-derived carbons (CDCs), thanks to their tunable nanoporous structure. The fabrication of interdigitated micro-supercapacitors from chlorination of sputtered TiC films on silicon wafer is presented here. On-chip CDC film electrodes were successfully prepared and tested in aqueous electrolyte, delivering high volumetric capacitance of 410 F.cm
⁻³
. Moreover, the use of ionic liquids/solvent mixtures provided larger potential windows, leading to high energy densities up to 90 μWh.cm
⁻²
.