Super hard carbon microtubes derived from natural cotton for development of high performance titanium composites

Super hard carbon microtubes derived from natural cotton are developed as a cost effective filler for composite applications. Two different carbon materials including synthesized carbon microtubes (CMT) and carbon nanotube (CNT) were used to produce titanium laminate composite via spark plasma sintering process. The sintering process was performed at 1200 °C for both Ti-CMT and Ti-CNT samples which led to the fully densified composites. The proposed mechanism confirmed by cross-sectional XRD investigation revealed formation of Titanium Carbide (TiC) between Ti layers as interfacial bonding phase. A significant improvement in bending strength (1273 ± 11 MPa) and hardness (537 ± 28 Vickers) of Ti-CMT composites was observed compared to titanium laminate and Ti-CNT composite. The results of current study demonstrate the considerable potential of inexpensive yet super hard carbon based material for various composite applications. •Cotton based carbon microtube(CMT) have been successfully used as filler for titanium composite for the first time.•CMT/Ti composites showed higher mechanical performance compared to CNT/Ti.•Different interfacial bonding mechanism developed the strengthening of composite.•Carbon microtubes demonstrated great potential as low-cost and effective filler.