Kinetics of fiber solidification.

Many synthetic or natural fibers are produced via the transformation of a liquid solution into a solid filament, which allows the wet processing of high molecular weight polymers, proteins, or inorganic particles. Synthetic wet-spun fibers are used in our everyday life from clothing to composite reinforcement applications. Spun fibers are also common in nature. Silk solidification results from the coagulation of protein solutions. The chemical phenomena involved in the formation of all these classes of fibers can be quite different but they all share the same fundamental transformation from a liquid to a solid state. The solidification process is critical because it governs the production rate and the strength that fibers can sustain to be drawn and wound. An approach is proposed in this work to investigate the kinetics of fiber solidification. This approach consists in circulating solidifying fibers in the extensional flow of a surrounding liquid. Such as polymers in extensional flows, the fibers break if resultant drag forces exceed the fiber tensile strength. The solidification kinetics of nanotube composite fibers serves as a validation example of this approach. The method could be extended to other systems and advance thereby the science and technology of fiber and textile materials. It is also a way to directly visualize the scission of chain-like systems in extensional flows.

Substantial improvement of nanotube processability by freeze-drying.

As-produced carbon nanotubes often contain a fraction of impurities such as metal catalysts, inorganic supports, and carbon by-products. These impurities can be partially removed by using acidic dissolution. The resulting nanotube materials have to be dried to form a powder. The processability of nanotubes subjected to regular (thermal vaporisation) drying is particularly difficult because capillary forces pack and stick the nanotubes irreversibly, which limits their dispersability in polymeric matrices or solvents. We show that this dramatic limitation can be circumvented by using freeze-drying instead of regular-drying during nanotube purification process. In this case, the nanotubes are trapped in frozen water which is then sublimated. As a result the final powder is significantly less compact and, more important, the nanotubes can be easily dispersed with no apparent aggregates, thereby greatly enhancing their processability, e.g., they can be used to make homogeneous composites and fibers. Results from coagulation spinning from water-based dispersions of regularly-dried and freeze-dried nanotubes are compared. We also show that freeze-dried materials, in contrast to regularly-dried materials, can be dissolved in organic polar solvents using alkali-doped nanotubes. High resolution TEM and XRD analysis demonstrate that the nanotube structure and quality are not affected at the nanoscale by freeze-drying treatments.

Hot-drawing of single and multiwall carbon nanotube fibers for high toughness and alignment.

We report a new hot-drawing process for treating wet-spun composite fibers made of single- and multiwall carbon nanotubes and poly(vinyl alcohol). As shown in previous reports, untreated composite nanotube fibers exhibit a very large strain-to-failure, and their toughness, which is the energy needed to break the fibers, exceeds that of any other known materials. However, untreated composite nanotube fibers absorb a very small amount of energy at low strain and become degraded in humid conditions. In this work, we use hot-drawing treatments, a concept inspired from textile technologies, to improve the properties of nanotube/PVA fibers. This treatment yields a crystallinity increase of the PVA and an unprecedented degree of alignment of the nanotubes. These structural modifications lead to a markedly improved energy absorption at low strain and make the fibers resistant to moisture. Hot-drawn nanotube/PVA fibers hold great potential for a number of applications such as bulletproof vests, protective textiles, helmets, and so forth.

An experimental approach to the percolation of sticky nanotubes.

Percolation is a statistical concept that describes the formation of an infinite cluster of connected particles or pathways. Lowering the percolation threshold is a critical issue to achieve light and low-cost conductive composites made of an insulating matrix loaded with conductive particles. This has interest for applications where charge dissipation and electrical conductivity are sought in films, coatings, paints, or composite materials. One route to decreasing the loading required for percolation is to use rod-like particles. Theoretical predictions indicate that this may also be achieved by altering the interaction potential between the particles. Although percolation may not always respond monotonically to interactions, the use of adhesive rods can be expected to be an ideal combination. By using a system made of carbon nanotubes in an aqueous surfactant solution, we find that very small attraction can markedly lower the percolation threshold. The strength of this effect can thereby have direct technological interest and explain the large variability of experimental results in the literature dealing with the electrical behavior of composites loaded with conducting rods.