Superior performance of manganese oxide/multi-walled carbon nanotubes polymer actuator over ruthenium oxide/multi-walled carbon nanotubes and single-walled carbon nanotubes

Abstract

Abstract The electrochemical and electromechanical properties of poly(vinylidene fluoride- co -hexafluoropropylene) actuators developed using multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT)-ionic liquid gel electrode containing manganese oxide (MnO 2 ) were compared with those using ionic gels with only-MWCNTs, with MWCNTs and ruthenium oxide (RuO 2 ) or with only-single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNTs). The double-layer capacitance of the MWCNT electrode containing MnO 2 was larger than the one with the MWCNT electrode containing RuO 2 , only-MWCNTs or only-SWCNTs. Furthermore, the MWCNT electrode containing MnO 2 exceeded the performance of the other three actuators in terms of both strain and maximum generated stress. Both MWCNTs and MnO 2 were required to produce large strain and quick response actuators that surpassed the performance of the polymer actuator containing only-SWCNTs.