Superior performance of manganese oxide/multi-walled carbon nanotubes polymer actuator over ruthenium oxide/multi-walled carbon nanotubes and single-walled carbon nanotubes

摘要

The electrochemical and electromechanical properties of poly(vinylidene fluoride-co-hexafluoropropylene) actuators developed using multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT)-ionic liquid gel electrode containing manganese oxide (MnO_2) were compared with those using ionic gels with only-MWCNTs, with MWCNTs and ruthenium oxide (RuO_2) or with only-single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNTs). The double-layer capacitance of the MWCNT electrode containing MnO_2 was larger than the one with the MWCNT electrode containing RuO_2. only-MWCNTs or only-SWCNTs. Furthermore, the MWCNT electrode containing MnO_2 exceeded the performance of the other three actuators in terms of both strain and maximum generated stress. Both MWCNTs and MnO_2 were required to produce large strain and quick response actuators that surpassed the performance of the polymer actuator containing only-SWCNTs.