Ordered Nanostructures of Carbon Nanotube–Polymer Composites from Lyotropic Liquid Crystal Templating

Kasprzak, Christopher R.; Scherzinger, Evan T.; Sarkar, Amrita; Miao, Miranda; Porcincula, Dominique H.; Madriz, Alejandro M.; Pennewell, Zachary M.; Chau, Sophia S.; Fernando, Raymond H.; Stefik, Morgan; Zhang, Shanju

doi:10.1002/macp.201800197

Cited by 10 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Sci. 2019, 9, x FOR PEER REVIEW 20 of 47 composites with SWCNTs are organized into ordered nanostructures with both lamellar and gyroid nanostructures [327]. Apart from this, the alignment and assembly of CNTs in traditional thermotropic LCs [2,[328][329][330][331] and macromolecular LCs [332,333] have also been reported.…”

Section: Lc-aided-assembly and Self-assembly Of Nanomaterialsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perspectives in Liquid-Crystal-Aided Nanotechnology and Nanoscience

2019

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The research field of liquid crystals and their applications is recently changing from being largely focused on display applications and optical shutter elements in various fields, to quite novel and diverse applications in the area of nanotechnology and nanoscience. Functional nanoparticles have recently been used to a significant extent to modify the physical properties of liquid crystals by the addition of ferroelectric and magnetic particles of different shapes, such as arbitrary and spherical, rods, wires and discs. Also, particles influencing optical properties are increasingly popular, such as quantum dots, plasmonic, semiconductors and metamaterials. The self-organization of liquid crystals is exploited to order templates and orient nanoparticles. Similarly, nanoparticles such as rods, nanotubes and graphene oxide are shown to form lyotropic liquid crystal phases in the presence of isotropic host solvents. These effects lead to a wealth of novel applications, many of which will be reviewed in this publication. the observation of chirality from achiral molecules, resulting from sterically induced packing of the bent-core mesogens [10], such as ferroelectricity or the formation of helical superstructures in the B7 phase [14]. Thermotropic LCs are commonly constituted by single organic entities or mixtures thereof, which exhibit various mesophases at different temperatures or pressures [15], illustrated in Figure 1b. As the temperature rises, a typical thermotropic LC passes through higher ordered phases, also called soft crystals, the hexatic smectic phases with positional order as well as bond orientational order, through the fluid smectic phases (SmC and SmA), which exhibit both positional and orientational order, and finally to the nematic phase (N) with purely orientational order, into the isotropic phase. The number of different phases observed depends on the chemical composition, symmetry and order of the LC molecules. About 25 different thermotropic phases are known to date, and they are still increasing in number. Appl. Sci. 2019, 9, x FOR PEER REVIEW 2 of 47 unique effects of the observation of chirality from achiral molecules, resulting from sterically induced packing of the bent-core mesogens [10], such as ferroelectricity or the formation of helical superstructures in the B7 phase [14]. Thermotropic LCs are commonly constituted by single organic entities or mixtures thereof, which exhibit various mesophases at different temperatures or pressures [15], illustrated in Figure 1b. As the temperature rises, a typical thermotropic LC passes through higher ordered phases, also called soft crystals, the hexatic smectic phases with positional order as well as bond orientational order, through the fluid smectic phases (SmC and SmA), which exhibit both positional and orientational order, and finally to the nematic phase (N) with purely orientational order, into the isotropic phase. The number of different phases observed depends on the chemical composition, symmetry and order of the LC molecules. About...

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Section: Lc-aided-assembly and Self-assembly Of Nanomaterialsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perspectives in Liquid-Crystal-Aided Nanotechnology and Nanoscience

2019

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“…While self-assembled materials hold significant potential for improved OSN performance, we are not aware of any work to date implementing self-assembled nanostructures for OSN in the 1-nm regime. This is likely due to the significant challenges associated with doing so-apart from the difficulty associated with maintaining membrane stability in organic solvents with different polarities, the difficulty of preserving self-assembled nanostructures in thin films (32)(33)(34) and the potential need for nanostructural alignment to ensure good permeance (35)(36)(37) represent significant obstacles in the fabrication of practical OSN membranes with ordered nanostructure. A recently developed strategy addresses these challenges however.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tunable organic solvent nanofiltration in self-assembled membranes at the sub–1 nm scale

et al. 2022

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Organic solvent–stable membranes exhibiting strong selectivity and high permeance have the potential to transform energy utilization in chemical separation processes. A key goal is developing materials with uniform, well-defined pores at the 1-nm scale, with sizes that can be tuned in small increments with high fidelity. Here, we demonstrate a class of organic solvent–stable nanoporous membranes derived from self-assembled liquid crystal mesophases that display such characteristics and elucidate their transport properties. The transport-regulating dimensions are defined by the mesophase geometry and can be controlled in increments of ~0.1 nm by modifying the chemical structure of the mesogen or the composition of the mesophase. The highly ordered nanostructure affords previously unidentified opportunities for the systematic design of organic solvent nanofiltration membranes with tailored selectivity and permeability and for understanding and modeling rejection in nanoscale flows. Hence, these membranes represent progress toward the goal of enabling precise organic solvent nanofiltration.

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“…Polymer nanocomposites continue to fascinate the scientific community, generating tens of thousands of citations in 2020 alone. Carbon nanotubes, , graphene, silica, − titanium dioxide, cobalt, gold, , and clay − represent only a subset of the vast array of inorganic nanomaterials utilized in these composites. Organic nanomaterials such as cellulose, , chitin and chitosan, and synthetic polymers continue to sculpt the future of materials research as well.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Vat Photopolymerization of Reinforced Styrene–Butadiene Elastomers: A Degradable Scaffold Approach

Kasprzak

Brown

Feller

et al. 2022

ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces

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Vat photopolymerization (VP) is a high-throughput additive manufacturing modality that also offers exceptional feature resolution and surface finish; however, the process is constrained by a limited selection of processable photocurable resins. Low resin viscosity (<10 Pa·s) is one of the most stringent process-induced constraints on resin processability, which in turn limits the mechanical performance of printed resin systems. Recently, the authors created a VP-processable photosensitive latex resin, where compartmentalization of the high molecular weight polymer chains into discrete particles resulted in the decoupling of viscosity from molecular weight. However, the monomers used to form the hydrogel green body resulted in decreased ultimate material properties due to the high cross-link density. Herein, we report a novel scaffold that allows for facile UV-based AM and simultaneously enhances the final part’s material properties. This is achieved with a chemically labile acetal-containing cross-linker in conjunction with N-vinylpyrrolidone, which forms a glassy polymer after photocuring. Subsequent reactive extraction cleaves the cross-links and liberates the glassy polymer, which provides mechanical reinforcement of the geometrically complex VP-printed elastomer. With only a 0.1 wt % loading of photoinitiator, G′/G′′ crossover times of less than 1 s and green body plateau moduli nearing 105 Pa are obtained. In addition, removal of the hydrophilic and thermally labile scaffold results in decreased water uptake and increased thermal stability of the final printed part. Ultimate strain and stress values of over 650% and 8.5 MPa, respectively, are achieved, setting a new benchmark for styrene–butadiene VP elastomers.

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Ordered Nanostructures of Carbon Nanotube–Polymer Composites from Lyotropic Liquid Crystal Templating

Cited by 10 publications

References 42 publications

Perspectives in Liquid-Crystal-Aided Nanotechnology and Nanoscience

Perspectives in Liquid-Crystal-Aided Nanotechnology and Nanoscience

Tunable organic solvent nanofiltration in self-assembled membranes at the sub–1 nm scale

Vat Photopolymerization of Reinforced Styrene–Butadiene Elastomers: A Degradable Scaffold Approach

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