Synthesis and Fabrication of Carbon Nanotube Based Composite Materials for Fuel Cell Catalyst and Ultra-Resilient Aerogel

Abstract

Carbon nanotubes have been actively investigated in a wide range of applications since carbon nanotubes have excellent electrical, thermal, and mechanical properties. In particular, a great deal of research is being carried out to improve and control their properties by different functionalization methods. Among them, I have developed two functionalization methods for the controlling of properties, which are doping carbon nanotubes with heteroatoms and fabricating polymer composite based on carbon nanotubes.

I studied a facile one-step synthesis method of nitrogen-iron coordinated carbon nanotube catalysts without precious metals. Our catalyst shows excellent onset ORR potential comparable to those of other precious metal free catalysts, and the maximum limiting current density from our catalysts is larger than that of the Pt-based catalysts.

In addition to the development of carbon nanotubes-based aerogel composite, I studied the facile and quick process for the scalable production of super resilient CNT-PDMS composite by microwave heating with ultra-low thermal conductivity and high electrical properties. This report describes that the microwave heating process can lead to a quick reaction and allow for the uniform polymer layer on CNT, which enhance the mechanical properties of carbon nanotube composite. Furthermore, CNT-PDMS composite aerogel shows high mechanical strength (0.18 MPa), compressibility, thermal insulation (26 mW m-^1 K^-1) and elasticity-dependent electric conduction.