Carbon nanostructure preblends and their applications

Abstract

A method for preparing a “preblend” of nanostructured carbon, such as nanotubes, fullerenes, or graphene, and a particulate solid, such as polymer beads, carbon black, graphitic particles or glassy carbon involving wet-mixing and followed by optional drying to remove the liquid medium. The preblend may be in the form of a core-shell powder material with the nanostructured carbon as the shell on the particulate solid core. The preblend may provide particularly improved dispersion of single-walled nanotubes in ethylene-α-olefin elastomer compositions, resulting in improved reinforcement from the nanotubes. The improved elastomer compositions may show simultaneous improvement in both modulus and in elongation at break. The elastomer compositions may be formed into useful rubber articles.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A preblend composition comprising carbon nanostructures and a particulate solid, said preblend composition prepared by wet-mixing said carbon nanostructures and said particulate solid in a liquid medium followed by drying;
 wherein the preblend composition comprises solid core particles of said particulate solid coated with a shell of said carbon nanostructures forming a core-shell material;   wherein said particulate solid comprises polymer beads; and   wherein the carbon nanostructures comprise single-walled carbon nanotubes.   
     
     
         2 . The preblend composition of  claim 1  wherein at least a portion of the polymer beads have a diameter of approximately 1 micron. 
     
     
         3 . The preblend composition of  claim 1  wherein the preblend further comprises a nanotube network with carbon black particles dispersed therein. 
     
     
         4 . The preblend composition of  claim 1  wherein at least a portion of the particles of the particulate solid are regular or irregular in shape and have a size in the range of 20 nm to 20 μm in terms of average longest dimension. 
     
     
         5 . The preblend composition of  claim 1  wherein the shell coating on the core particles cover a surface area in the range of 50-100% of the total surface area of the core particles. 
     
     
         6 . A material composition comprising the preblend composition of  claim 1 , wherein said material composition is a polymer composition, an electrolyte medium, a paint, a coating, or a slurry. 
     
     
         7 . An article comprising the preblend composition of  claim 1 , wherein said article is a rubber article, a battery electrode, or a super capacitor. 
     
     
         8 . The article of  claim 7 , wherein said rubber article is a belt, hose, tire, or vibration control component.