Effective amino-functionalization of carbon nanotubes for reinforcing epoxy polymer composites. Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • An effective functionalization method was investigated to take full advantage of the exceptional performance of both carbon nanotubes and epoxy polymer for composite application. Epoxy polymer curing agent, EPI-W, was grafted to the single-walled carbon nanotubes through diazotization. Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, differential scanning calorimetry, dynamical mechanical analysis and thermo-gravimetric analysis were performed to characterize the functionalization effect. The degree of functionalization was estimated to be 1 in 50 carbons in the nanotube framework. The elastic modulus of the nanocomposite was enhanced 24.6% with only 0.5wt% loading of functionalized carbon nanotubes, in contrast to the 3.2% increase of un-functionalized carbon nanotube reinforced composite. This significant improvement suggested an effective way to realize an industrial application of nanotubes reinforcing epoxy composite.

published proceedings

  • Nanotechnology

altmetric score

  • 3

author list (cited authors)

  • Wang, S., Liang, Z., Liu, T., Wang, B., & Zhang, C.

citation count

  • 216

complete list of authors

  • Wang, Shiren||Liang, Zhiyong||Liu, Tina||Wang, Ben||Zhang, Chuck

publication date

  • March 2006