Abstract
High-pressure carbon monoxide (HiPco)-synthesized single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) have been a widely studied carbon nanomaterial for nearly two decades. It has been the de facto standard for SWCNT research, be it functionalization, separation and purification, or composites, as a result of the consistent, high-quality material that was made available at an affordable price to researchers worldwide. The recent shutdown of the HiPco reactor at Rice University has resulted in a scarcity of HiPco material available to the research community, and a new source of similar SWCNTs is desperately needed. Continued research and development on the design, materials used, and the overall process have led to a new HiPco material, referred to as NoPo HiPCO®, as an alternative to the erstwhile Rice HiPco SWCNTs. In this work, we have compared the two HiPco materials, and aim to provide more clarity for researchers globally on the state of HiPco SWCNTs for research and applications alike in 2019.
Highlights
Carbon nanotubes have been at the forefront of materials research for the better part of three decades with single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) taking precedence over their multi-walled variants
Raw high-pressure carbon monoxide (HiPco) SWCNTs were obtained from Atom Optoelectronics, Inc. (HPR 194.3, formerly a collective batch synthesized at Rice University, Houston, TX, USA) and used as such without further modification
A photograph of the as-prepared NoPo HiPco SWCNTs is shown in Figure 1 in comparison to the Rice HiPco SWCNTs
Summary
Carbon nanotubes have been at the forefront of materials research for the better part of three decades with single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) taking precedence over their multi-walled variants. Synthesis of SWCNTs has always been key in progressing this field of research, with various techniques having been developed for this, including arc discharge [8,9], laser ablation [10,11], and chemical vapor deposition (CVD) [12,13,14] All three of these processes have been successfully used for commercial SWCNT synthesis; CVD offers the most control over the final product when it comes to chirality and diameter alike. One specific approach of the CVD process was the high-pressure carbon monoxide (HiPco) gas-phase synthesis of SWCNTs developed at Rice University in Houston, TX in the early 2000s [15] This method, resulting in the catalytic production of SWCNTs via the decomposition of Fe(CO) in the presence of a continuous flow of carbon monoxide at high temperature and pressure, has been synonymous with SWCNT research due to the university providing a stable, inexpensive supply of consistent, high-quality SWCNTs for researchers and companies around the world. We report a detailed comparison of the two HiPco materials to provide a baseline for researchers
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