Shampoo assisted aligning of carbon nanotubes toward strong, stiff and conductive fibers

Jiaojiao Wang; Jingna Zhao; Lin Qiu; Fengcheng Li; Changle Xu; Kunjie Wu; Pengfei Wang; Xiaohua Zhang; Qingwen Li

doi:10.1039/d0ra02675a

Shampoo assisted aligning of carbon nanotubes toward strong, stiff and conductive fibers

RSC Adv. 2020 May 18;10(32):18715-18720. doi: 10.1039/d0ra02675a. eCollection 2020 May 14.

Authors

Jiaojiao Wang^{1

2}, Jingna Zhao^{1

3}, Lin Qiu⁴, Fengcheng Li⁴, Changle Xu^{1

2}, Kunjie Wu^{1

3}, Pengfei Wang⁵, Xiaohua Zhang^{6

3}, Qingwen Li¹

Affiliations

¹ Division of Advanced Nano-Materials and Key Laboratory of Multifunctional Nanomaterials and Smart Systems, Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences Suzhou 215123 China qwli2007@sinano.ac.cn.
² Nano Science and Technology Institute, University of Science and Technology of China Suzhou 215123 China.
³ Division of Nanomaterials, Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences Nanchang 330200 China.
⁴ School of Energy and Environmental Engineering, University of Science and Technology Beijing Beijing 100083 China.
⁵ CAS Key Laboratory for Mechanical Behavior and Design of Materials, Department of Modern Mechanics, University of Science and Technology of China Hefei 230027 China.
⁶ Innovation Center for Textile Science and Technology, Donghua University Shanghai 201620 China zhangxh@dhu.edu.cn.

Abstract

High alignment and densification of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are of key importance for strengthening CNT fibers, whereas direct stretching has a very limited effect when CNTs are highly entangled. We report that by lubricating CNT surfaces with viscous alcohols, the relative motion between CNTs improves because of the reduced sliding energy barrier; thus non-stretched regions are effectively eliminated. Owing to the very efficient optimization of the assembled structure, the stretched CNT fibers exhibited an average tensile strength of 2.33 GPa (1.82 N per tex) and modulus of 70.1 GPa (54.8 N per tex). Other fundamental properties, such as electrical and thermal conductivities, were also remarkably improved. Such a strategy can be readily used for manufacturing high-performance CNT assemblies and composites.