Researchers at AIST have demonstrated the synthesis of nanoporous carbonaceous materials and carbonaceous materials with layered nanostructures through a simple process involving the chemical modification of common sugars such as sucrose and fructose.
Nanoporous carbonaceous materials have attracted considerable attention as materials that can help address energy-related challenges, with potential applications as catalyst supports and electrode materials for secondary batteries. Particularly, carbonaceous materials with highly uniform pore sizes and shapes, which can be tailored for specific applications, are in increasing demand. The widely exploited, conventional templating method, however, suffers from several drawbacks, including the need for sacrificial template agents and complex synthesis procedures, which render the templating method resource-consuming and wasteful. Furthermore, some templating procedures rely on energy-intensive and harsh chemical processes involving high temperatures and strong acids.
A research group at AIST has developed a new method that enables the synthesis of nanostructured carbonaceous materials solely from chemically modified sugar molecules. The method utilizes sugar molecules bearing an alkyl chain through targeted chemical modification as carbon precursors. These precursors are subjected to hydrothermal treatment, during which condensation reactions take place. This approach provides access to nanostructured carbonaceous materials without relying on conventional templates or harsh chemical processing. Furthermore, the nanostructure of the resulting carbonaceous material can be altered by varying the type of sugar headgroup, yielding either a nanoporous carbonaceous material with spherical nanopores or a carbonaceous material with a layered nanoscale structure.
This work represents a shift from the current, "physical" pore formation pathway based on the templating method to a "chemical" pore formation pathway. The researchers expect that the presented method will serve as a synthesis platform for designing novel nanoporous carbonaceous materials with nanostructural features that are inaccessible through conventional templating methods. By utilizing such materials as scaffolds for various chemical reactions, improved material performance in applications such as electrodes and catalyst supports may be realized.
Details of this research were published online in Journal of the American Chemical Society on August 12, 2026.
Background
Nanoporous carbonaceous materials have numerous nanoscale pores and large specific surface area, and have been widely recognized for their ability to store electricity, adsorb substances, and promote chemical reactions. For example, in application studies including energy storage and fuel cells, nanoporous carbonaceous materials provide a platform for charge storage processes as well as various chemical reactions.
Activated carbon, a widely known porous carbonaceous material, is used for water purification and deodorization due to high porosity that can capture molecules of various sizes. However, its pore size and shape are normally not uniform. In contrast, when endowed with pores that are uniform in size and shape, porous carbonaceous materials exhibit the additional function of capturing molecules of specific sizes, thereby offering advantages for applications such as energy storage, gas separation, and catalysis. This situation has accelerated the demand for nanoporous carbonaceous materials that have uniform pore structures and are suitable for these applications.
As an effective tool for accessing carbonaceous materials with controlled nanoscale pores, the templating method has been extensively utilized. In a general templating procedure, either polymeric agents or pre-formed inorganic materials are used as sacrificial templates. Mixing a carbon source with the template, followed by carbonization and template removal, yields porous carbonaceous materials. Despite being a well-established strategy for fabricating porous carbonaceous materials with uniform pores, the templating method has limitations in controllability of nanopore architecture. The limitations mainly stem from the dependence of the method on the variety and availability of templates, which are essentially limited to certain archetypes. Additionally, in this method, the carefully prepared templates are sacrificed during the process, while the template-removal step further relies on harsh chemical treatments requiring strong acids or high temperatures of several hundred degrees Celsius.
Hence, for producing nanoporous carbonaceous materials with tailored pore architectures, synthetic strategies that offer flexible control over pore structures while maintaining synthetic simplicity and mild reaction conditions have been highly desirable.
Points
- Direct production of a nanoporous carbonaceous material has been achieved using chemically modified sugar as a precursor, offering potential applications in electrodes and catalyst supports.
- Eliminating the need for conventional template agents, the future potential for resource- and energy-efficient synthesis has been presented.
- Varying sugar type and chemical modification mode is expected to enable the design and synthesis of carbon nanostructures tailored to specific applications.
