Magnetic hierarchically porous biomass carbon for realizing broadband and strong absorption of electromagnetic wave

Hierarchically porous carbon materials provide favorable conditions for electromagnetic wave loss enhancement due to the superimposed positive influence of multilevel pores. However, high production costs and complex preparation limit their large-scale production. Biomass carbon with a natural hierarchically porous structure offers an alternative; however, the impedance mismatch and single-loss mechanism prevent biomass carbon from being an ideal absorbent for broadband and strong absorption. In this study, a series of magnetic hierarchically porous biomass carbons were prepared using a facile adsorption-inert calcination method. The natural hierarchical porous structure of the loofah sponge provides numerous adsorption sites for ferric ions, which are transformed in situ into Fe₃O₄ during calcination to regulate the conductivity. The impedance matching and electromagnetic loss properties of the biomass carbon/Fe₃O₄ composites were adjusted by varying the amount of ferric nitrate. Optimal performance occurs when ferric nitrate weighs 0.8 g, and the calcination temperature is 600 °C. Under these conditions, the effective absorption bandwidth reaches 5.28 GHz (11.84–17.12 GHz, 2.5 mm), and the minimum reflection loss (RL_min) is as low as −52.54 dB (4.5 mm), which is achieved by superior impedance matching and strong conduction loss together with polarization loss due heterogeneous interfaces and carbon defects. Our work provides a new perspective and a simple method for the large-scale production of high-efficiency biomass-based electromagnetic wave absorbents.