Uniform and High Yield Carbon Nanotubes with Modulated Nitrogen Concentration for Promising Nanoscale Energetic Materials

Uniform and High Yield Carbon Nanotubes with Modulated Nitrogen Concentration for Promising Nanoscale Energetic Materials Hao Liu, Yong Zhang, Ruying Li, Hakima Abou-Rachid, Louis-Simon Lussier and Xueliang Sun a Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, University of Western Ontario, London, ON. N6A 5B9, Canada b Defence Research & Development Canada – Valcartier, 2459 Boulevard PieXI Nord, Quebec, QC. G3J 1X5, Canada Abstract: It is well known that pure polynitrogen systems are metastable. Recently, a theoretical study showed that when polymeric nitrogen chain is encapsulated in a carbon nanotube, it will be stable at ambient pressure and room temperature, which makes carbon nanotubes new promising as nanoscale energetic materials. Here, we report a systematic study of multi-walled carbon nanotubes with different nitrogen-doping amounts produced by aerosol assisted chemical vapor deposition, in which growth temperature, hydrogen flow rate and aerosol amount have been varied. The morphological and compositional changes of N-doped carbon nanotubes were characterized by means of scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The detailed investigation of N-doped carbon nanotubes will provide a route to obtain evidence of the above theoretical prediction and will have potential applications in nanoscale energetic materials.