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Facile morphology controllable synthesis of zinc oxide decorated carbon nanotubes with enhanced microwave absorption

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Abstract

The microscopic morphology of the composites has a great influence on their microwave absorbing (MA) performances. However, it remains a challenge to achieve morphology control through a facile way when preparing composites of carbon nanotubes and zinc oxide. In this work, a simple and room-temperature approach is proposed to synthesize zinc oxide/carbon nanotubes (CNT/ZnO) nanocomposites with different microstructures. Changing the type of solvent can lead to different microstructures of CNT/ZnO nanocomposites. This is mainly because of the different ion molar ratio to Zn2+ and OH- in the reaction solution. Besides by adjusting the content of CNT, the microwave absorbing properties of the obtained CNT/ZnO nanocomposites can be controlled. When the CNT content is 10% mass fraction, the minimum reflection loss (RL) of CNT/ZnO-E nanocomposite can reach − 55.42 dB at a thickness of 3 mm. With the increasing weight ratio of CNT, the degree of disorder in the material and the number of the defects increase, 3D conductive networks are easier to form, resulting in the enhanced polarization loss and conductive loss. However, excessive CNTs will cause excessive current induced which is not conducive to electromagnetic wave absorption.

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I would like to declare on behalf of my co-authors that the work described was original research that has not been published previously, and not under consideration for publication elsewhere, in whole or in part. All the authors listed have approved the manuscript that is enclosed.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the Supported by Program for the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 52071053, U1704253), the National Key R&D Program of China (2017YFB0703103), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (DUT20GF111), and the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2020M670748).

Funding

The authors acknowledge the Supported by Program for the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 52071053, U1704253), the National Key R&D Program of China (2017YFB0703103), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (DUT20GF111), and the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2020M670748).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Solidification Control and Digital Preparation Technology (Liaoning Province), School of Materials Science and Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, 116085, People’s Republic of China

    Huan Zhang, Huifang Pang, Yuping Duan, Weiping Zhang & Tongmin Wang

  2. Innovative Center for Advanced Materials, Hangzhou Dianzi University, Hangzhou, 310018, People’s Republic of China

    Xuefeng Zhang

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  1. Huan Zhang
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  2. Huifang Pang
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  3. Yuping Duan
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Correspondence to Yuping Duan or Tongmin Wang.

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Zhang, H., Pang, H., Duan, Y. et al. Facile morphology controllable synthesis of zinc oxide decorated carbon nanotubes with enhanced microwave absorption. J Mater Sci: Mater Electron 32, 12208–12222 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-021-05850-5

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