All-in-one integration of polyaniline-polyvinyl alcohol electrode/electrolyte interface for tailorable solid-state supercapacitors

With the boom of intelligent electronics, developing tailorable energy devices that can be directly cut and stitched into different shapes is high desirable. Traditional supercapacitors still have difficulty meeting the application requirements of multiple scenarios for wearable devices due to the fragile interface. Herein, we report a tailorable solid-state supercapacitor prepared by integrating the active materials of polyaniline (PANI) nanofibers with the gel-electrolyte of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) (PANI-PVA) by interface engineering. This formative unique all-in-one PANI-PVA architecture endows supercapacitor devices with a strengthened electrode/electrolyte interface effect, thereby inducing faster charge transfer and a more stable structure. As a result, the fabricated PANI-PVA electrode exhibits excellent electrochemical performance, including with an eminent specific capacitance (1.88 F cm−2 at 0.1 mA cm−2), a high rate properties (80 % at 1.0 mA cm−2) and an outstanding cycling stability (78.3 % after 3000 cycles). More importantly, an all-solid-state supercapacitor based on this PANI-PVA of all-in-one integrated interface can be cut into several segments with broadened voltages, and can also be self-healing to normally operate after cutting. In addition, this supercapacitor can be stitched into the common fabric to adapt it to wearable electronic devices. This work aims to resolve the electrode/electrolyte interface issues and also provides a new idea for the versatile application of flexible solid-state supercapacitors.