Carbon Nanotubes: A Review on Synthesis, Properties and Applications

Abstract — Carbon Nanotubes (CNTs) are allotropes of carbon with a nanostructure that can have a length-to-diameter ratio greater than 1,000,000. These cylindrical carbon molecules have novel properties that make them potentially useful in many applications in nanotechnology. Formally derived from the grapheme sheet they exhibit unusual mechanical properties such as high toughness and high elastic moduli. Referring to their electronic structure, they exhibit semiconducting as well as metallic behavior and thus cover the full range of properties important for technology. Nanotubes are categorized as single-walled nanotubes and multiple walled nanotubes. Techniques have been developed to produce Nanotubes in sizeable quantities, including arc discharge, laser ablation, chemical vapor deposition, silane solution method and flame synthesis method. The properties and characteristics of CNTs are still being researched heavily and scientists have barely begun to tap the potential of these structures. Without doubt, carbon nanotubes represent a material that offers great potential, bringing with it the possibility of breakthroughs in a new generation of devices, electric equipment and bio fields. Overall, recent studies regarding CNTs have shown a very promising glimpse of what lies ahead in the future of CNTs in nanotechnology, optics, electronics, and other fields of materials science