Communications of the ACM
Making Carbon Nanotubes as sable as Common Plastics
A professor at Northwestern University is using a commercially available solvent to disperse carbon nanotubes at record high concentrations.
Credit: Northwestern Now
Northwestern University's Jiaxing Huang is using a commercially available solvent to disperse carbon nanotubes at record high concentrations without additives or volatile chemical reactions.
He also has learned that as the nanotubes' concentrations grow, the material transitions from a dilute dispersion into a paste, then into a free-standing gel and finally a sculptable dough.
To prevent the nanotubes from clumping and impeding desirable characteristics, Huang's team added the simple solvent cresol, which keeps the nanotubes' surface functions intact; once the entangled tubes are separated, researchers can remove the cresol by rinsing or heating.
The paste, gel, and dough forms of the nanotubes can be molded, reconfigured, or employed as conductive ink for three-dimensional (3D) printing.
"Essentially, this solvent system now makes nanotubes behave just like polymers," Huang says. "It is really exciting to see cresol-based solvents make once hard-to-process carbon nanotubes as usable as common plastics."
From Northwestern Now
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