Preparation of liquid crystalline single-walled carbon nanotube aqueous dispersions and their liquid crystal phase behaviors

Abstract

Single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) are tubular carbon allotropes with high electrical conductivity and high tensile strength which appear along the tube directions, therefore, the control of SWCNT orientation in materials is very important. Liquid crystalline SWCNT dispersions are expected to be the raw materials of highly oriented SWCNT materials. However, the liquid crystal (LC) phase behaviors of SWCNT aqueous dispersions hadn’t been discussed in detail. In this study, we investigated the preparation process of rod-like SWCNT dispersions which are suitable for SWCNT LC by differential centrifugal sedimentation (DCS) method. Furthermore, we achieved the first report of the direct observations of Schlieren textures of SWCNTs in liquid phase.