| Carbon nanotube yarn is a long, continuous and highly assembled fiber, which comes from carbon nanotube aerogels. Theoretically, it can provide unique properties such as extreme toughness, excellent electrical and thermal conductivities. Our aim is to increase the conductivity of nanotube yarns by loading other materials such as silver nanowires (AgNWs), multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) ink and single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) ink into the yarns to create composite fibers. The effects of different types of silver nanowires, concentrations of materials and incorporating methods have been studied. The composite fiber can possess a high conductivity up to 25.2 x 102 S/cm by loading AgNWs-130 and tensile strains were enhanced by twice by AgNWs-130 MWCNT and SWCNT MWCNT composite fibers when compared to pure multi-walled carbon nanotube yarns. This simple and easy method of fabricating composite carbon nanotube yarns provides a route to other types of nanotube yarns. The results also can be improved further by welding tubes by sigma and pi bonds chemically. |
