Study the mechanism that carbon nanotubes improve thermal stability of polymer composites: An ingenious design idea with coating silica on CNTs and valuable in engineering applications

Silica nanotubes (SNTs) were coated on the surface of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) to form SNTs@CNTs core-shell hybrids, which is an ingenious and rigorous method to study the effect of CNTs for improving thermal stability of composites. SNTs@CNTs, CNTs, SNTs were introduced to silicone rubber (SR) and the different composites were tested and analyzed. The difference in the properties of SR-based composites leads us to get the specific mechanism that CNTs improve thermal stability of composites. This work reveals the mechanism on CNTs improving thermal stability of composites systematically and detailedly for the first time. The theoretical research provides an efficient guideline for further studying CNTs to improve properties of composites. Moreover, SNTs@CNTs/SR composites are also valuable in engineering applications. Experimental results show that the properties of SNTs@CNTs/SR are much better than CNTs/SR. Especially the initial thermal degradation temperature (Ti) of SNTs@CNTs/SR composites is 41 °C higher than that of SR.