A facile and mild route for the preparation of holey phosphorene by low-temperature electrochemical exfoliation

Holey phosphorene, a novel type of nano-black phosphorus, has been theoretically predicted to have potential for a wide range of applications in catalysis, membrane separation and other fields. However, its practical application is limited by its method of preparation. Up to now, the only reported battery-assisted method for preparing holey phosphorene is complicated, time-consuming and not at all environmentally friendly. Herein, a low-temperature electrochemical exfoliation method which is both environmentally friendly and adaptable is proposed for the preparation of holey phosphorene. More importantly, the pore size of the resulting holey phosphorene can be adjusted, which would be useful in applications including photocatalysis and gas membrane separation. AFM, TEM, Raman and XPS results show that the horizontal size and thickness of the holey phosphorene are 0.3–1.4 μm and 1–2 nm, respectively, while the pore sizes range from several to dozens of nanometers