Metastable intermolecular composites of Al and CuO nanoparticles assembled with graphene quantum dots

Metastable intermolecular composites (MICs) have attracted great attention during the last two decades owing to their potential applications for both civilian and military purposes. In this work, a novel category of MICs are assembled using Al and CuO nanoparticles (NPs), and graphene quantum dots (GQDs) as building blocks. It has been demonstrated that the as-assembled Al/GQDs/CuO MICs show unique energetic performance in contrast to the physical mixture of Al and CuO NPs. More specifically, the MICs assembled at relatively higher temperature and with proper Al : GQDs : CuO ratio of 20 : 1 : 90 (in weight) exhibit overall better energetic performances, including a higher heat releasing rate and larger specific heat. It was also illustrated that the specific heat amount released during the reaction can be lifted by whittling the oxide layer of the Al NPs surface, revealing that the inactive oxide layer on Al NPs should be one of the main reasons influencing the energetic performances of the MICs. Nevertheless, this work shows that the GQDs should be a useful media for MICs assembling.