Nanocomposites based on Carbon Nano-Tubes CNTs and metal or metal alloy nano-particles (NPs) distributed inside or outside the cavity of CNTs and graphene can be used in different fields such as catalysis (for their large surface area), electronics (the NPs alter the electronic properties), drug deli-very, tips for scanning probe microscopies, etc.
The expertise in the synthesis of such systems has been established at ISM since a decade. The synthesis is carried out at low temperature, thus it can also be easily extended to organic molecules such as dyes and drugs. This method also allows the filling of any type of cavity, including ordered nanocavities on a substrate.
More recently the synthesis of graphene oxide was also developed starting from graphite and applying the same techniques, such as freeze-drying of products, we have developed and introduced since 2007 for CNTs. This technique allows to obtain graphene oxide and, starting from this product, a reduced graphene with a remarkably high value of surface area per gram (600 m2/g).
Staff: Aldo Capobianchi, Paolo Rocchi
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