The Origin of Charge Transport Synergism in the Hybrid of Geometrically Anisotropic and Conductive Nanoparticles: A Monte Carlo Simulation Study

Typically, there is a synergistic effect in physical properties and, specifically charge transport for the hybrid of geometrically anisotropic and conductive nanoparticles such as carbon nanotube and graphene. Although most of the investigations claim that this synergistic effect originates from an improvement in the state of dispersion, it is also observable in some cases with a well-dispersed morphology. In this work, we provide a quantitive analysis of the origin of synergism from a network structure perspective. The results of our simulations demonstrated that the hybrid systems are more capable of constructing conductive pathways. This incredible capability arises from the simultaneous effect of higher active particles and a greater number of active neighboring particles in the network of hybrid particles, while the latter has the more significant impact. As a result, the normalized value of the average number of neighboring active particles, such as the average number of neighboring active particles on the onset of percolation, can be a proper index for system dimensionality and the systems synergism effectiveness.