*** Welcome to piglix ***

Hummers' Method


Hummers' method is a chemical process that can be used to generate graphite oxide through the addition of potassium permanganate to a solution of graphite, sodium nitrate, and sulfuric acid. It is commonly used by engineering and lab technicians as a reliable method of producing quantities of graphite oxide. It is also able to be revised in the creation of a one-molecule-thick version of the substance known as graphene oxide.

Graphite oxide is a compound of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen where there is a ratio between 2.1 and 2.9 of carbon to oxygen. Graphite oxide is typically a yellowish solid. It is also known as graphene oxide when used to form unimolecular sheets.

Hummers' method was developed in 1958 as a safer, faster and more efficient method of producing graphite oxide. Before the method was developed, the production of graphite oxide was slow and hazardous to make because of the use of concentrated sulfuric and nitric acid. The Staudenmeier–Hoffman–Hamdi method introduced the addition of potassium chlorate. However, this method had more hazards and produced one gram of graphite oxide to ten grams of potassium chlorate.

William S. Hummers and Richard E. Offeman created their method as an alternative to the above methods after noting the hazards they posed to workers at the National Lead Company. Their approach was similar in that it involved adding graphite to a solution of concentrated acid. However, they simplified it to just graphite, concentrated sulfuric acid, sodium nitrate, and potassium permanganate. They also did not have to use temperatures above 98 °C and avoided most of the explosive risk of the Staudenmeier–Hoffman–Hamdi method.

The procedure starts with 100 g graphite and 50 g of sodium nitrate in sulfuric acid at 66 °C which is then cooled to 0 °C. 300 g of potassium permanganate is then added to the solution and stirred. Water is then added in increments until the solution is approximately 32 liters.

The final solution contains about 0.5% of solids to then be cleaned of impurities and dehydrated with phosphorus pentoxide.


...
Wikipedia

...