Hierarchically porous carbon foam composites with highly dispersed Fe2O3 nanoparticles confined in the foam pores, facilely fabricated by hydrolysis-driven emulsion polymerization strategy. The as-generated acidic conditions of Fe3+ hydrolysis could catalyze the polymerization of phenolic resin, and the carbon-based composite materials containing iron oxides were obtained in situ. The structural characterization results show that HCF@Fe2O3 NPs-2 electrode has the largest specific surface area (549 m2/ g) and pore volume (0.46 cm3/ g). Electrochemical results indicates that typical HCF@Fe2O3 NPs-2 electrode displays good capacitive properties. including high specific capacitance (225 F/g at 0.2 A/g current density). Excellent magnification performance (capacity retention rate 80% as current density increases from 0.2 to 10 A/g). At the same time, HCF@SnO2 NPs was successfully synthesized by replacing hydrolyzed tin tetrachloride with ferric chloride. This study provides a new idea for the preparation of metal oxide–carbon matrix composites, and also highlights the potential of such carbon foams in application of energy storage.

A novel synthesis of carbon foam@Fe2O3 via hydrolysis-driven emulsion polymerization for supercapacitor electrodes
    Abstract
    1 Introduction
    2 Experimental section
        2.1 Chemical and materials
        2.2 Materials synthesis
        2.3 Material characterization
        2.4 Electrochemical measurements
    3 Results and discussion
        3.1 Morphology and structure of HCF@Fe2O3 NPs
        3.2 Electrochemical properties of HCF@Fe2O3 NPs samples
    4 Conclusion
    Anchor 13
    Acknowledgements 
    References

• Congxu Wu(Engineering Research Center of Phosphorus Resources Development and Utilization of Ministry of Education, Key Laboratory of Novel Biomass-Based Environmental and Energy Materials in Petroleum and Chemical Industry, Hubei Key Laboratory of Novel Reactor and Green Chemical Technology, School of Chemistry and Environmental Engineering, Wuhan Institute of Technology, Wuhan 430205, China)
• Wei Xiong(Engineering Research Center of Phosphorus Resources Development and Utilization of Ministry of Education, Key Laboratory of Novel Biomass-Based Environmental and Energy Materials in Petroleum and Chemical Industry, Hubei Key Laboratory of Novel Reactor and Green Chemical Technology, School of Chemistry and Environmental Engineering, Wuhan Institute of Technology, Wuhan 430205, China)
• Hao Li(Advanced Institute for Materials Research (WPI‑AIMR), Tohoku University, Sendai 980‑8577, Japan)