Hypergolic systems rely on organic fuel and a powerful oxidizer that spontaneously ignites upon contact without any external ignition source. Although their main utilization pertains to rocket fuels and propellants, it is only recently that hypergolics has been established from our group as a new general method for the synthesis of different morphologies of carbon nanostructures depending on the hypergolic pair (organic fuel-oxidizer). In search of new pairs, the hypergolic mixture described here contains polyaniline as the organic source of carbon and fuming nitric acid as strong oxidizer. Specifically, the two reagents react rapidly and spontaneously upon contact at ambient conditions to afford carbon nanosheets. Further liquid-phase exfoliation of the nanosheets in dimethylformamide results in dispersed single layers exhibiting strong Tyndall effect. The method can be extended to other conductive polymers, such as polythiophene and polypyrrole, leading to the formation of different type carbon nanostructures (e.g., photolumincent carbon dots). Apart from being a new synthesis pathway towards carbon nanomaterials and a new type of reaction for conductive polymers, the present hypergolic pairs also provide a novel set of rocket bipropellants based on conductive polymers.

Biotechnology Laboratory Department of Biological Applications and Technologies University of Ioannina 45110 Ioannina Greece

Department of Materials Science and Engineering University of Ioannina 45110 Ioannina Greece

Nanotechnology Centre VŠB Technical University of Ostrava 17 listopadu 2172 15 708 00 Ostrava Poruba Czech Republic

Physics Department University of Ioannina 45110 Ioannina Greece

Regional Centre of Advanced Technologies and Materials Czech Advanced Technology and Research Institute Palacký University Olomouc Křížkovského 511 8 779 00 Olomouc Czech Republic

Regional Centre of Advanced Technologies and Materials Palacky University in Olomouc Slechtitelu 27 779 00 Olomouc Czech Republic

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