Structural and mechanical characterization of platelet graphite nanofibers

Xinqi Chen, Zhi Hui Xu, Xiaodong Li, Medhat A. Shaibat, Yoshitaka Ishii, Rodney S. Ruoff*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

33 Scopus citations

Abstract

Platelet graphite nanofibers have been characterized by scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, electron diffraction, X-ray photoemission spectroscopy, and atomic force microscopy. The results show that the graphene sheets are stacked parallel to each other and are perpendicular to the fiber axis; the interlayer spacing is 0.34 nm. A small fraction of carbon atoms are bonded to oxygen. Solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance shows that hydrogenated carbons are under the detection limit (<5%) and that the nanofibers are dominated by sp2-bonded carbons. Mechanical measurements were made on individual nanofibers by nanoindentation.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)416-423
Number of pages8
JournalCarbon
Volume45
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Feb 2007

Funding

The authors would like to thank C. Jameson and J. Yesinowski for stimulating discussions, S. Li for help on SAED measurements, and L. Girifalco and W. Gerberich for their comments on the manuscript. Initial work on this project (XC and RSR) was supported from the NSF (DMR-0304508 and CMS-0304506) and by the NASA BIMat URETI # NCC-1-02037. The solid-state NMR work was supported in part by the Alzheimer’s Association (NIRG 035123), the Dreyfus Foundation Teacher-Scholar Award program, and the NSF CAREER program (CHE 449952) for YI. Z.-H. Xu and X. Li were supported by the NSF (Grant No. EPS-0296165), the ACS Petroleum Research Fund (ACS PRF# 40450-AC10), the South Carolina Space Grant Consortium-NASA, and the University of South Carolina NanoCenter Seed Grant. The SEM, TEM, and XPS measurement were performed in the NUANCE Center at Northwestern University. The NUANCE Center is supported by the NSF-NSEC, NSF-MRSEC, Keck Foundation, the State of Illinois, and Northwestern University.

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Chemistry
  • General Materials Science

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