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Epitaxial pyrolytic carbon coatings templated with defective carbon nanotube cores for structural annealing and tensile property improvement

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Abstract

Thermal annealing of chemical vapor deposition (CVD)-grown carbon nanotubes (CNTs) is a practical method for reducing defects in CNTs, which is essential for promoting applications of CNTs in nanoscale or microscale materials. However, the increase in annealing temperature fails to bring noticeable improvements in the tensile properties of CNTs, implying the negative influence of carbon sublimation on the defect healing process. Here we propose a two-step annealing strategy for improving the microstructure and tensile properties of CVD-grown CNTs. This has been achieved through the epitaxial growth of pyrolytic carbon thin layers at the CNT surface and then followed by graphitization treatment at 2200 °C for 1 h. Tensile performances of two-step annealed CNTs have been investigated by in situ tests in a scanning electron microscope. The results show that the average Young’s modulus and fracture strength of two-step annealed CNTs are improved approximately by 35% and 10%, respectively, compared to those of one-step annealed CNTs. Such an enhancement can be ascribed to the well-aligned CNT walls with fewer structural defects, supported by the characterization results from transmission electron microscope, X-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopy. The two-step annealing strategy developed in this study for improving the mechanical properties of CNTs is expected to be applicable to a practical fabrication process.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Dr. T Miyazaki from the Technical Division, School of Engineering, Tohoku University, for technical assistance in TEM analysis; we thank Professors T Wada and H Kato from the Institute for Materials Research, Tohoku University, for their helpful suggestions; we thank Dr. K Takahashi from Toyota ZEV Factory for the technical assistance; we thank LINTEC OF AMERICA, INC., Nano-Science & Technology Center (NSTC), for supplying the MWCNT sheets. This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number JP19K14837.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Fracture and Reliability Research Institute, Tohoku University, 6-6-11, Aza-Aoba, Aramaki, Aobaku, Sendai, Miyagi, 980-8579, Japan

    Fan Liu & Toshiyuki Hashida

  2. Department of Aerospace Engineering, Tohoku University, 6-6-01, Aza-Aoba, Aramaki, Aobaku, Sendai, Miyagi, 980-8579, Japan

    Keiichi Shirasu

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  1. Fan Liu
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FL had contributed to conceptualization and methodology, and wrote the original draft; FL and TH carried out structure analysis; KS and TH were involved in writing, reviewing and editing and funding acquisition. All authors have read and agreed to the submitted version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Fan Liu.

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Liu, F., Shirasu, K. & Hashida, T. Epitaxial pyrolytic carbon coatings templated with defective carbon nanotube cores for structural annealing and tensile property improvement. J Mater Sci 56, 19015–19028 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-021-06523-8

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