Abstract

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) based polymer composites have variety of engineering applications (electromagnetic shielding, antistatic coatings, high-strength low-density corrosion-resistant components, lightweight energy storage and many more); due to their excellent mechanical, electrical, chemical, magnetic, etc. properties. In the polymer nanocomposites CNTs are dispersed in the polymeric matrix. However the dispersion may be uniform or may not be uniform. The biggest challenge is the effective dispersion of individual CNTs in the polymer matrices, as CNTs tends to form clusters and bundles due to strong van der Waals’ forces of attraction. The aggregated structure continue until physical (Mechanical) or chemical modification (Encapsulation/surface modification) of CNTs. Few modification methods such as vigorous mixing of the polymers damages CNTs structure, and may hinder their properties. But these problems can be overcome by mechanical or chemical modification of CNTs surfaces. In the chemical modification, the modifier or the long tail surfactant may encapsulate and/or partially wrap the CNTs surfaces. In this review, recent work on CNTs based polymer nanocomposite is carried out with few modifiers/encapsulating agents. Incorporation of CNTs in polymer matrix changes the performance properties such as tensile strength, tensile modulus, elongation at break, toughness, Dynamic mechanical thermal analysis (DMTA), etc. The phase morphology of the composite materials throws light on the properties of CNTs based polymer nanocomposite. Moreover phase morphology may be directly correlated with the behavior of the material, hence reviewed here through transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Furthermore review is also carried out on the non-isothermal crystallization (DSC) and rheology of CNTs polymer nanocomposite.

Highlights

  • Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) based polymer matrices creates a class of novel materials exhibiting superior mechanical, thermal, electrical and barrier properties suitable to replace many existing materials for engineering applications

  • Phase morphology may be directly correlated with the behavior of the material, reviewed here through transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM)

  • Various studies involving on single wall carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) and multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) have shown that, CNTs can have high modulus and strength levels in the range 200 - 1000 GPa and 200 - 900 MPa respectively [2,4]

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Summary

Introduction

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) based polymer matrices creates a class of novel materials (nanocomposites) exhibiting superior mechanical, thermal, electrical and barrier properties suitable to replace many existing materials for engineering applications. These surface-modification methods are milder than the covalent approach, and usually cause little disruption to the structure or conductivity of CNTs. The idea of chemical modification of CNTs is to increase the interfacial adhesion with wettability of polymer/CNTs composites and the strength and other mechanical properties of the composites.

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