Paper Number
GR14 

Session
Gallery of Rheology Contest

Title
Carbon nanotube macrostructures from controlled elongational flow

Presentation Date and Time
October 17, 2018 (Wednesday) 6:30

Track / Room
Gallery of Rheology / Woodway Foyer

Authors (Click on name to view author profile)

1. Owens, Crystal E. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Mechanical Engineering)
2. Hart, A. John (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Mechanical Engineering)
3. McKinley, Gareth H. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)

Author and Affiliation Lines (in printed abstract book)
Crystal E. Owens, A. John Hart, and Gareth H. McKinley
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139

Speaker / Presenter 
Owens, Crystal E.

Text of Abstract
In these 3D-printed structures, more than 50 billion carbon nanotubes have assembled to form a delicate, conductive object. The sharp upper tip was created by necking due to capillary forces while printing in a mostly-extensional flow, reminiscent of the process which creates chocolate Hershey’s Kisses. The scanning electron micrographs show a surface wrinkled by counterdiffusion and the evaporation-driven shrinkage from when the nanotubes precipitated from the original solvent and dried. At a closer scale, the alignment of large fibrils of nanotubes is evident, and the resulting high inter-tube contact area gives rise to the desirable conductivity of the structures.