Abstract
Polyacrylonitrile (PAN) is one of the materials most often used for carbonization. PAN nanofiber mats, created by electrospinning, are an especially interesting source to gain carbon nanofibers. A well-known problem in this process is fixing the PAN nanofiber mats during the stabilization process which is necessary to avoid contraction of the fibers, correlated with an undesired increase in the diameter and undesired bending. Fixing this issue typically results in breaks in the nanofiber mats if the tension is too high, or it is not strong enough to keep the fibers as straight as in the original state. This article suggests a novel method to overcome this problem by electrospinning on an aluminum substrate on which the nanofiber mat adheres rigidly, stabilizing the composite and carbonizing afterwards either with or without the aluminum substrate to gain either a pure carbon nanofiber mat or a metal/carbon composite.
Highlights
Electrospinning can be used to create nanofiber, e.g., from polyacrylonitrile (PAN) which is a typical precursor of carbon nanofibers [1,2,3]
Samples of the electrospun nanofiber mats were stabilized in a muffle furnace B150 (Nabertherm, Lilienthal, Germany), approaching a typical stabilization temperature of 280 ◦ C at a heating rate of 1 ◦ C/min, followed by isothermal treatment at this maximum temperature for 1 h
The nanofibers show a slightly larger diameter, connected with fewer undesired beads. The latter are typically for PAN nanofiber mats spun from DMSO with relatively low solid contents
Summary
Electrospinning can be used to create nanofiber, e.g., from polyacrylonitrile (PAN) which is a typical precursor of carbon nanofibers [1,2,3]. Such carbon nanofibers can be applied, e.g., to improve the mechanical properties of plastic materials by forming a composite with a polymer or a resin, the electrical properties of batteries and super-capacitors, etc. The first step is a stabilization process which is typically performed in air, resulting in cyclization and thermally stable aromatic ladder polymer formation [8] which increases the chemical and mechanical stability of the nanofiber mat and is essential before the carbonization step. E.g., investigated different stabilization temperatures between 260 and 290 ◦ C and heating rates up to 5 ◦ C/min, showing that for the PAN they used a heating rate of 1 ◦ C/min and a final temperature of 270 ◦ C resulted in maximum tensile strength of the final carbon fibers carbonized at 1350 ◦ C [12]
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