Construction of 3D V2O5/hydrogenated-WO3 nanotrees on tungsten foil for high-performance pseudocapacitors

3D semiconductor nanostructures have proved to be a rich system for the exploring of high-performance pseudocapacitors. Herein, a novel 3D WO3 nanotree on W foil is developed via a facile and green method. Both capacitance and conductivity of the WO3 nanotree electrode are greatly improved after hydrogenation treatment (denoted as H-WO3). First-principles calculation based on the experiments reveals the mechanism of the hydrogenation treatment effect on the 3D WO3 nanotrees. The surface O of 3D WO3 nanotrees gains electrons from the adsorbed H, and consequently certain electrons are back-donated to the neighboring W, thus providing the conducting channel on the surface. Ultrathin V2O5 films were coated on the H-WO3 nanotrees via a simple, low-cost, environmentally friendly electrochemical technique. This V2O5/H-WO3 electrode exhibited a remarkable specific capacitance of 1101 F g−1 and an energy density of 98 W h kg−1. The solid-state device based on the V2O5/H-WO3 electrodes shows excellent stability and practical application. Our work opens up the potential broad application of hydrogenation treatment of semiconductor nanostructures in pseudocapacitors and other energy storage devices.