Liquid crystal behavior of single wall carbon nanotubes Original Research Article

Single wall carbon nanotubes are dispersed in water with the water-soluble polymer polyvinylpyrrolidone and the surfactant sodium dodecylbenzene sulfonate, and then deposited by evaporative deposition onto degeneratively-doped silicon wafer substrates. These deposits were examined by scanning electron microscopy, which revealed highly-ordered arrays of large single wall carbon nanotube bundles. Various solution concentrations were prepared and deposition conditions were varied to determine their affect on the single wall carbon nanotube arrays. These observations were related to existing lyotropic liquid crystal theory and theories explaining the behavior of carbon nanotubes in solution, which allowed for further development and interpretation of the phase diagram which describes the behavior of single wall carbon nanotubes in lyotropic liquid crystal systems, and how competing liquid crystal systems in the same solution directly affect the ordering of the single wall carbon nanotube arrays.