Copper–Carbon Nanotube Composites Enabled by Brush Coating for Advanced Conductors

Abstract

There is a growing demand for advanced conductors with enhanced electrical properties to increase the energy efficiency in various applications. A promising strategy to achieve this involves the use of ultraconductive copper (UCC) composites that incorporate highly conductive carbon materials, such as carbon nanotubes (CNTs), into the copper matrix. In this study, we present a scalable brush coating technique to incorporate CNTs onto Cu substrates to produce Cu−CNT−Cu composites. The process involves brush coating the CNT solution on Cu tape substrates, followed by vacuumassisted thermal removal of organic moieties (e.g., surfactant/polymer). This step ensures the creation of a uniformly distributed CNT network within the Cu matrix. By addition of a thin film Cu overlayer, the fabricated Cu−CNT−Cu composite architecture demonstrates similar electrical conductivity, increased current carrying capacity, and enhanced mechanical properties compared to pure Cu reference tapes. The performance characteristics of these UCC tapes along with the scalability of the brush coating approach hold great promise for the fabrication of advanced conductors for wide-ranging energy applications.