In situ growth of CNTs on carbon fiber by chemical vapor deposition

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs), as a kind of one-dimensional nanomaterial with special structure, have excellent properties in various aspects. Grafting CNTs onto carbon fiber (CF) surface to improve the mechanical properties of carbon fiber reinforced composites has been the focus at home and abroad. In this paper, chemical vapor deposition (CVD) was used to in situ grow CNTs on CF surface with carbon monoxide (CO) as carbon source and ferric nitrate (Fe (NO3)3·9H2O) as catalyst. The effect of different process conditions on the growth of CNTs were explored and the mechanism was briefly described. It is found that the oxidation treatment of CF could introduce a large number of reactive groups on the surface of CF, which was conducive to uniform dispersion of the catalyst. The morphology of CNTs were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The results showed that the optimum growth concentration of catalyst precursor was 0.05 mol/L.