Electrical and thermal conductivities of aluminum-based composites containing multi-walled carbon nanotubes

Aluminum-based composites containing multi-walled carbon nanotubes are produced by a powder metallurgy route involving a ball-milling technique. Effects of processing parameters on the dispersion of multi-walled carbon nanotubes and resulting properties are investigated. Multi-walled carbon nanotubes, initially located on the powder surface with maintaining their connectivity, become dispersed individually and embedded progressively in the aluminum powder during a milling process. The composite with individually dispersed multi-walled carbon nanotubes shows a good strength but poor electrical and thermal conductivities. On the other hand, the composite with a network structure of MWCNTs reveals much enhanced electrical conductivity of 3.316 × 10⁷ Sm⁻¹ and thermal conductivity of 172 W/m K.