Compressive stress-electrical conductivity characteristics of multiwall carbon nanotube networks

0356766 - ÚH 2011 RIV US eng J - Journal Article
Slobodian, P. - Říha, Pavel - Lengálová, A. - Sáha, P.
Compressive stress-electrical conductivity characteristics of multiwall carbon nanotube networks.
Journal of Materials Science. Roč. 46, č. 9 (2011), s. 3186-3190. ISSN 0022-2461. E-ISSN 1573-4803
R&D Projects: GA AV ČR IAA200600803
Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z20600510
Keywords : carbon nanotube network * compression * electrical conductivity * stress sensor
Subject RIV: BK - Fluid Dynamics
Impact factor: 2.015, year: 2011

A network of entangled multiwall carbon nanotubes is presented as a conductor whose conductivity is sensitive to compressive stress both in the course of monotonic stress growth and when loading/unloading cycles are imposed. The testing has shown as much as 100% network conductivity increase at the maximum applied stress. It indicates favorable properties of multiwall carbon nanotube networks for their use as stress-electric signal transducers. To model the conductivity-stress dependence, it is hypothesized that compression increases local contact forces between nanotubes, which results in more conductive contacts. The lack of detailed knowledge of the mechanism as well as an unclear shift from individual contacts to the whole network conductance behavior is circumvented with a statistical approach. In this respect, good data representation is reached using Weibull distribution for the description of distribution of nanotube contact resistance.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0195202