eng Science and Education Publishing Nanoscience and Nanotechnology Research 2014-11-30 2 1 12 17 10.12691/nnr-2-1-3 NNR2014213 article M.O. Danilov danilovmickle@rambler.ru 1 I.A. Slobodyanyuk 1 I.A. Rusetskii 1 G.I. Dovbeshko 2 G.Ya. Kolbasov 2 Vernadskii Institute of General & Inorganic Chemistry of Nat. Acad. Sci., Kyiv, Ukraine Institute of Physics Nat. Acad. Sci., Kyiv, Ukraine Reduced graphene oxide (RGO) was obtained by chemical synthesis from multi walled carbon nanotubes. Using a suitable oxidant, we longitudinally “unzipped” nanotubes to form graphene oxide nanoribbons and then obtained RGO with a proper reductant. Standard redox potentials of carboxy groups were used for choosing oxidant and reductant. It has been shown that the required oxidant potential in acid medium should be more + 0.528 V and reductant potential in alkaline medium- less - 1.148 V. Current-potential curves for oxygen electrodes based on RGO, obtained by using the oxidants K2Cr2O7, KMnO4 and the reductants NaH2PO2, Na2SO3, were analyzed. The electrochemical characteristics of RGO in the oxygen reduction reaction were depended on the redox power of the reagents. We demonstrated that obtained RGO could be promising material for oxygen electrodes of fuel cells. http://pubs.sciepub.com/nnr/2/1/3/nnr-2-1-3.pdf reduced graphene oxide (RGO) synthesis electrode materials fuel cells oxygen electrodes