Evaluation of Carbon Nano Webs produced by Needleless and Conventional Electro-spun PAN-MWCNT Nanofibers Precursor

Polyacrylonitrile (PAN) Nanofibers and Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) were fabricated by using the needleless and conventional electrospinning. CNT-Activated carbon nanofibers prepared by stabilization, carbonization, and activation processes and evaluated by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) and BET method. SEM analysis showed that by increasing the concentration of MWCNT the average nanofibers diameter changed for pure and activated nanofibers and electrical conductivity and viscosity of nanofibers were increased. DSC plots showed different enthalpy and cyclization degree of embedding of MWCNTs in PAN nanofibers. Also, the generated nanofibers from disk shape nozzles were finer with a narrower distribution than produced by the cylinder type. The nanofibers produced by needleless method provided larger diameter nanofibers with less uniformity and higher production rate comparing to the conventional method. FTIR Spectroscopy and XRD studies showed that PAN-MWCNT nanofibers exhibited higher crystallinity compared to PAN nanofibers and the crystallite size was decreased. The XRD analysis revealed that different diffraction angles (2θ) in stabilized and carbonized PAN-MWCNT nanofibers that shifted to the smaller one by increasing of carbon nanotubes contents. The BET results indicated the improvement of porosity in MWCNT-ACNF nanofibers comparing to ACNF nanofibers and diameter of pore was decreased.