The alkaline synthesizing method for improved thermal characteristics of CNT/alumina nanocomposite

Abstract

The multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) and Alumina (Al2O3) (CNT/Alumina) have been synthesized by two different simple methods including mechanical and chemical fabrication. The effect of the weight ratio of MWCNTs to Alumina on dispersion characteristic and thermal conductivity has been studied. To confirm that it is the success process, the morphological and structural investigations were carried out using transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy. The whole results indicated that the chemical synthesized CNT/Al2O3 (c-CNT/Al2O3) were possessed good dispersion as compared to mechanical synthesized CNT/Al2O3 (m-CNT/Al2O3). However, for the dispersion stability, although c-CNT has higher value than m-CNT, m-CNT/Al2O3 were higher than c-CNT/Al2O3 for the nanofluid. The highest thermal conductivity enhancement was revealed when the weight ratio of (1:1) for the nanocomposite. The results were indicated that the synthesis methods were simple, environmentally-friendly and it has very effective characteristics than other chemical treatment.