THREE-DIMENSIONAL STRUCTURE OF MULTI WALL CARBON NANO-TUBE IN NATURAL RUBBER STUDIED BY TRANSMISSION ELECTRON MICROTOMOGRAPHY

摘要

A nano-composite material consisting of natural rubber with multi wall carbon nano-tubes (MWCNT/NR) with several compositions were studied by transmission electron microtomography (TEMT), in order to understand the three-dimensional (3D) nano-structure of MWCN and also effectively to develop the MWCNT/NR for industrial materials. TEMT is one of the most powerful microscopic techniques for obtaining real-space 3D images of nano-composite materials. The 3D image clearly showed that the MWCNT formed 3D networks inside the NR matrix. It was found that the 3D networks of the MWCNT were increasing as the concentration of MWCNT was increasing. In addition, the MWCNT did not contact with each other.