Quantized prediction of coefficients of thermal expansion of 3-D CNT-Graphene junctioned carbon nanostructures

A computational finite element analysis based on a structural molecular mechanics approach was conducted to predict effective coefficients of thermal expansion (CTE) of a novel three-dimensional carbon nanostructure, pillared graphene structure (PGS), which is constituted with several graphene sheets and single-walled carbon nanotubes. Four sets of representative unitcell models were developed atomistically having different geometric parameters of pillar length and inter-pillar distance in the PGS. Periodic boundary conditions were applied to periodic unitcell geometries to yield consistent results. Parametric study shows that both pillar length and inter-pillar distance significantly affect the effective in-plane and through-thickness CTEs. The PGS with smaller inter-pillar distance and larger pillar length yields higher in-plane CTEs, while that with larger inter-pillar distance and smaller pillar length yields higher through-thickness CTE. The calculation yields negative through-thickness CTE at low temperatures (T<100 K) for all sets of PGSs, which is associated with the curvature at the junction.