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Application of carbon nanotube reinforced polymers in space industry is widely dispread due to the unique and multi-purpose properties of them Therefore, extraction of electrical and electromagnetic properties of nanocomposite materials in the frequency band of 12.4 to 18 GHz is an important issue in their development procedure. In this paper, experimental investigations on electrical and electromagnetic properties of carbon nanotube reinforced polymers are performed. The investigated properties include AC and DC electrical conductivities, permittivity, transmission and reflection coefficients, loss tangent and skin depth in Ku frequency band (12.4-18 GHz). The in situ polymerization method is selected to fabricate multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT)/Vinylester nanocomposite. Ultrasonic device is used for dispersion of CNTs in resin and then Vector Network Analyzer (VNA) is employed for measurement of electrical properties of specimens. Weight fraction of MWCNT is chosen between 0.1 to 3 % in order to evaluate the influence of CNT content on investigated properties. Finally, equivalent circuit model is used to describe the observed behavior on the basis of semi-empirical study.

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In this paper, the influence of carbon nanotubes on vibrational properties of laminated composite plates is studied theoretically and experimentally. The plates are made of glass/epoxy composite. Multi walled and single walled carbon nanotubes in different weight percentages are added to these composites. At first, carbon nanotubes are dispersed in the epoxy resin via ultrasonic procedure. Then the composite plates are made by hand layup and vacuum bagging methods in a mould manufactured for this research. Mechanical properties of the fiber composite reinforced by carbon nanotubes calculated using modified Halphin-Tsai equations. Next composite plates are modeled in ABAQUS software and frequency analysis is done. Also vibrational properties of structure are obtained by experimental modal analysis in fixed boundary condition. Experimental results showed 210% increase in damping for samples which have 0.5 weight percent of single walled carbon nanotubes (in comparison with plane glass/epoxy composite plates). Also a good agreement was observed between obtained natural frequencies from finite element analyses and experimental tests.

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In this study, forced convective heat transfer and pressure drop behavior of multi walled carbon nanotubes (CNT)-water nanofluid were evaluated under constant heat flux in a circular tube. For this purpose, first, homogeneous aqueous suspension of CNT using gum Arabic (GA) surfactant was prepared in concentrations 0.05%, 0.1% and 0.2% wt. Then, the above mentioned nanofluids were evaluated in Reynolds number range of 800-2000 under constant heat flux. The results indicate a significant increase in convective heat transfer coefficient of nanofluids with the addition of small amounts of CNT in deionized water. Also, heat transfer coefficient is enhanced with increasing concentration and Reynolds number. However, the effect of increasing concentrations of CNT is higher than the increase in Reynolds number. In addition, the pressure drop data on the different concentrations and Reynolds numbers are also investigated. At low weight concentrations of CNT, the deal of pressure drop of nanofluids containing CNT and base fluids is approximately similar and the gap between them is negligible. This means that no extra pump power is required for low concentration CNT/water nanofluid. The maximum increase in heat transfer coefficient is 42.8%, which occurred at Re=2027, and a concentration of 0.2% wt.

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Due to extensive usage of nitrogenous fertilizers and discharge of industrial and domestic wastewater, nitrate contamination of water is becoming a main environmental concern. High levels of nitrate in drinking water causes serious health problems such as methemoglobinemia in infants and gastric cancer. Because of such health problems, nitrate removal from water is urgent and has been a hot topic over the recent years. Various technologies such as the ion exchange, reverse osmosis, electrocatalytic, adsorption, electrodialysis and biological process, have been used to eliminate nitrate ion from water and wastewater. Nevertheless, these methods have several drawbacks such as high installation and maintenance costs, difficult operation, brine production, membrane fouling, further treatment, slow process and carbon source requirement. A large number of investigators thus have focused on the reduction of nitrate by the electrochemical process usually because of its efficiency, very low sludge production, small area occupation and facile operation. Integration of electrochemical and biological processes as bioelectrochemical systems has been recommended to overcome the potential problems. In bioelectrochemical denitrification, denitrifying microorganisms make use of hydrogen generated at the cathode by the electrolysis of water as an electron donor to reduce nitrate into nitrogen gas. Autohyrogenotrophic denitrifying bacteria commonly adhere to the cathode surface and make a biocathode. Therefore, Cathode electrode material is one of the major factors that affecting in the bioelectrochemistry efficiency. Cathode material can directly affect to denitrifying bacteria attachment, hydrogen production, electron transfer and electrical conductivity. Bioelectrochemical process can be used to eliminate nitrate through a catholic reduction process. Carbon material has high mechanical strength and a rough surface which is ideal for the formation of biofilm as compared with metal materials. However, carbon materials are difficult to apply in large scale processes due to high electrical resistivity that tend to increase electrode ohmic losses. Hence, carbon electrodes are supported by a conductive material current collector such as carbon nanotubes and metallic materials. Carbon nanotubes have a good biocompatibility with bacteria and have not shown negative effect on biofilm formation. It had been reported that carbon nanotubes can facilitate transfer of electrons between bacteria and electrode in bioelectrochemistry. The aim of this study is bio-electrochemical removal of nitrate from wastewater using carbon nanotubes immobilized in cathode. This study has been done in a bathe scale bioelectrochemical rector with a two chambers. Considering that nitrate reduction done in biocathode, carbon nanotube used in cathode for increasing nitrate removal. The effects of pH, current density and retention time were evaluated for nitrate removal in a bio-electrochemical reactor.The highest nitrate reduction rates were occurs in neutral pH and current density of 15 mA/cm2. Furthermore, at current density of 15 mA/cm2 and retention time of 8 hours, the bioelecterochmical system can reduce the nitrate levels to below the environmental standard.The results showed that multi-wall carbon nanotube as cathode modifier increase the nitrate reduction efficiency about 14 persent. The use of multi-wall carbon nanotube can increased biofilm formation and therfor the reduction time for achieving to nitrate standard was reduced.

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The purpose of the present research is to investigate effects of long multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) on mechanical properties of epoxy resin and unidirectional glass fiber reinforced laminated polymeric composites. Therefore, mechanical properties of polymer (pristine resin), 0.5 wt.% MWCNT/epoxy nano-composites, E-glass/epoxy laminated composites and 0.5 wt.% MWCNT/E-glass/epoxy laminated nano-composites were evaluated. The tensile, flexural and shear moduli and strengths of epoxy polymer and nano-composites were experimentally characterized. Next, the longitudinal and transverse tensile stiffness and strength, also in-plane shear and flexural moduli and the strength of glass fiber laminated composites and glass fiber laminated nano-composites were determined. The experiment results of tensile specimens of laminated nano-composites reveal that the presence of the long MWCNTs improves the bounding properties of fibers in adjacent plies and postpones the failure mechanisms like fiber fracture under tension or edge delamination under shear loading conditions. It can be concluded that the improvement of mechanical properties in laminated composites are more significant than those of the pure epoxy with addition of long multiwall carbon nanotubes. For instance, the longitudinal tensile strength and shear strength of laminated nanocomposites increased by 34% and 26% in comparison with laminated composites, respectively.

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In this paper, the effects of adding carbon nanotubes to quasi-static punch shear properties (QS-PS) and mechanical properties of hybrid laminated composites has been investigated experimentally. The nanocomposites have 12 layers of 2D woven glass fiber with area density of 200g/m2, is manufactured by Hand lay-up method. Epoxy resin systems is made of a diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A (DGEBA), Epon 828, as the epoxy prepolymer and Epikure F-205 as the curing agent. In this study, was used the multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNTs) modified with hydroxide (-COOH), with weight fraction 0, 0.1, 0.5 and 1 respect to total weight of resin. Results of tensile test have showed, addition of carbon nanotubes can change tensile properties of matrix. Maximum increase can be seen in modulus of the resin of 0.5% nanotubes content around 31%. Moreover, the results of tensile properties of hybrid laminated nanocomposites show maximum change in toughness of sample of 0.5% nanotube content around 14% with increasing tensile strength and fracture strain. The results punch shear test show that the adding of carbon nanotubes has little effect on total energy absorbed so that maximum increase is around 4% in sample of 0.5 %.

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In this paper, the effects of the adding of carbon nanotubes on quasi-static punch shear behavior of glass/epoxy laminated composites under penetration of three different indenters has been investigated experimentally. The hybrid laminate nanocomposites have 12 layers is manufactured by Hand lay-up method. Fibers have a plain-weave configuration with density of 200 g/m2, while the epoxy resin system is made of diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A resin (DGEBA), Epon 828, with Epikure F-205 as the curing agent. The multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) modified with hydroxide (-COOH) are dispersed into the epoxy system in a 0% and 1% ratio in weight with respect to the matrix. In order to study of influence of the nose shape, three different indenters, flat, conical and ogival, were used. Moreover, the tensile test was performed on the nanomatrix and the hybrid laminate nanocomposite samples. The tensile test indicated that the addition of nanotubes on the tensile properties of resin were seen a significant increase, but no significant changes were observed in the tensile properties of the hybrid laminate nanocomposites. Results of the quasi-static punch shear test show that the highest contact force is exhibited by flat indenter, while the highest absorbed energy is shown by conical indenter. Totally, the adding of carbon nanotubes reduces the contact force and absorbed energy.

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The dynamic stability of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) and double-walled carbon nanotubes (DWCNT) embedded in an elastic medium subjected to combined static and periodic axial loads are investigated using Floquet–Lyapunov theory and bounded solution theory. An elastic Euler- Bernoulli beam model is utilized in which the nested slender nanotubes are coupled with each other through the van der Waals (vdW) interlayer interaction. The Galerkin’s approximate method on the basis of trigonometric mode shape functions is applied to reduce the coupled governing partial differential equations to a system of the extended Mathieu-Hill equations. Applying Floquet–Lyapunov theory and Rung-Kutta numerical integration method with Gill coefficients, the influences of number of layer, elastic medium, exciting frequency and combination of exciting frequency on the instability conditions of SWCNTs and DWCNTs are investigated. A satisfactory agreement can be observed by comparison between the predicted results of Floquet–Lyapunov theory with bounded solutions theory ones. Based on results, increasing the number of layers, and elastic medium, dynamic stability of SWCNTs and DWCNTs surrounding elastic medium increase. Moreover, the instability of CNTs increases by increasing the exciting frequency.

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Nanoparticles are being used nowadays to improve the mechanical and structural specification of Fiber Reinforced polymers (FRPs) due to production of hybrid & Multi scale composites. Electrophoretic deposition has been utilized to deposit a smooth layer of carbon nanoparticles on the surface of woven glass fibers, and later in the fiber/matrix interface of composite structure. Initially, the experimental parameters in deposition of CNTs investigated. Suspension concentration, field strength and process duration effects has been studied on the quality and quantity of deposition mass. Then the best situation has been used to fabricate CNT reinforced glass fiber-epoxy composite to evaluate its short beam strength and also quasi static indentation performance subject to lateral shear loads. Results demonstrates the salient effect of grafted CNTs in the nanocomposites interface on their mechanical behavior. The interlaminar shear strength of prepared nanocomposites has been increased by 42% regarding control samples and 10% improvement achieved in their quasi static performance. It has been shown that there is a range of optimum values for field and concentration due to stability of process and also deposition mass. The stability of process will restrain the field and concentration in the process. In best practices the current density values encountered between 0.5 and 1 mA/Cm2. The effect of field strength was around 8.5 times, but the effect of concentration was around 5.5 times. The current density diagram was steady in stable processes and the first three minutes of each process known as the effective deposition time.

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Annually, various concrete infrastructures are damaged and may collapse due to the presence of destructive factors. In this regard, the Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) provides a way to evaluate the safety and durability of a structure during its service life in order to ensure the serviceability and sustainability of it. Therefore, the sensor technology is a critical part to operate SHM system for recording of relevant data through its lifespan. Sensor is a device which is capable of identifying the probability or the value of parametric changes and showing them as a relevant output (typically electrical or optical signal. Making materials electrically conductive may be useful in many different ways such as creating piezoresistive sensors with the ability to acquire stress-strain or load-displacement data or creating sensors with the ability to acquire data on the extent of damage to the concrete. The piezoresistive sensor is capable of detecting the applied forces to the structure based on the changes in the electrical resistance. But the damage detection sensor operates based on the contacting conduction of CNTs. This means that by increasing the amount of CNTs in concrete, the three-dimensional contacting network of CNTs is built. When the amount of CNTs exceeds the percolation threshold, the contacting conduction will affect the electrical conduction of nanocomposites. One of the most significant and economical types of the sensor is the damage detection sensor which is provided by mixing conductive fibers (such as carbon nanotubes (CNT)) with concrete. For preparing damage detection sensor, CNTs and surfactants were mixed in the water for 10 minutes using a magnetism stirrer at 5000 rpm. Then, the mix was prepared at one ultrasonic dispersion energy. Then the cement and CNTs were added to high-speed mixer to be uniformly mixed. After adding the aggregate to the mixer, the concrete was placed in pre-oiled molds and by applying appropriate vibration, any air that may have been trapped was released. The specimens were curing for 28 dayes and they were tested under the static loading by Instron-Tech. test equipment. In order to remove the effect of polarization which is due to the movement of free ions in the concrete sensor during the measurement, an alternating current generator with the magnitude was used to nullify this phenomenon. After preparing the sensors, two main factors affecting the performance of concrete sensors are the amount of CNTs and their dispersion quality in the mixture. The goal of this study is to determine the optimum amount of CNTs with regard to the combined effects of the surfactant and the CNTs dispersion quality on the performance of the sensor using various criteria such as sensitivity of the sensor (Se), the standard deviation of the prediction error as electrical criteria and comparison and flexural strength as mechanical critera. The results have demonstrated that the sensor provided by 0.15 wt% CNTs, superplasticizer and SDS as a surfactant has the best performance. Also, The static criteria indicated that the quality of the dispersion (using proper surfactant material) and the amount of CNTs are effective on the sensitivity and the standard deviation of the prediction error, respectively.

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Many studies have been conducted on the absorption and protection of electromagnetic waves to reduce the harmful effects of electromagnetic radiation on the environment. High conductivity shields are used to prevent the penetration of electromagnetic waves. A convenient and useful method of obtaining electromagnetic shielding materials is the addition of conductive carbon materials including carbon fibers, carbon filaments, and carbon nanotubes. Carbon nanotubes can easily form a conductive network within a material field due to their two-dimensional tubular structures and high conductivity, which results in a high electrical permeability ambience. Therefore, the increase in dielectric losses results in reflection losses of electromagnetic waves. Thus, the presence of carbon nanotubes in the adsorbent improves the absorption properties of electromagnetic waves.
In this study, the electromagnetic wave absorbing properties of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) functionalization with carboxyl (-COOH) group /cement composites with different shapes; chiral, zigzag and armchair were studied by short circuit of the waveguide and matched load methods. The influence of the MWCNT shape and sample thickness on the electromagnetic wave absorbing properties were discussed and analyzed in the frequency range of 8–12 GHz by a short circuit of the waveguide and matched load methods. The samples were prepared in two thicknesses of 3 and 6 mm, and the amount of nanotubes added was 0.1%wt. The addition of 0.1 wt.% MWCNT greatly enhances the absorption performance of the cement mortar in the frequency range of  8–10 GHz. With the increase of thickness from 3 mm to 6 mm, the frequency bandwidths of the reflection loss for MWCNT/cement composites increases but the number of peaks decreases.  By comparing the results of electromagnetic wave absorbing of the samples with two different methods are deduced that in the samples with a thickness of 3 mm, the absorbing of waves by matched load method is better than short circuit method without matched load. However, in samples with a thickness of 6 mm, there is not much different. Also, the electromagnetic wave absorbing of the composite samples with a thickness of 3 mm performed better by short circuit method at frequencies below 10.5 GHz, while the composite samples had better absorbing in the matched load method at frequencies greater than 10.5 GHz. In addition, the electromagnetic wave absorbing of the composite samples with a thickness of 6 mm show better results by short circuit method at lower frequencies and by matched load method at higher frequencies. Moreover, the absorption behavior of the chiral sample with thickness 6 mm differs from the other two samples because the chiral nanotubes are asymmetric and zigzag and armchair nanotubes are symmetric. Furthermore, the structural analysis and surface morphology of MWCNT/cement composites with different shapes have been explored using the scanning electron microscope (SEM) technique. Scanning electron microscope images of MWCNT/cement composites show dispersion of nanotubes in composite. Connecting of nanotubes and cement leads to reduction of porosity and formation of regional conductive network. As a result, the electrical conductivity is increased and the electromagnetic field in the network is attenuated.

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This study was carried out with the aim of covalent immobilization of Aspergillus oryzae beta-galactosidase and Bacillus licheniformis protease on multi-walled amino-carbon nanotubes. In this method, fractional 2k design was used to study the effect of seven continuous factors (activation pH, glutaraldehyde molarity, activation time, buffer solution pH, buffer solution molarity, MWCNT-NH3-glutaraldehyde amount and stabilization time) on the stabilization efficiency and enzyme activity. . Design-expert software was used to analyze data and draw graphs. The results showed that the aforementioned factors predict the level of enzyme activity of Bacillus licheniformis protease and Aspergillus oryzae beta-galactosidase with correlation coefficients of 0.80 and 0.92 at the rate of 77 and 88%, respectively. Also, the correlation coefficient of the covalent fixation efficiency model of Aspergillus oryzae beta-galactosidase and Bacillus licheniformis protease on multi-walled carbon nanotubes was 0.89 and 0.82, respectively, and the studied factors were able to determine the covalent fixation beta efficiency, respectively. Aspergillus oryzae galactosidase and Bacillus licheniformis protease on multi-walled amino-carbon nanotubes predict 83 and 77%, respectively.

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This study developed carboxylated multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs-COOH) as sorbents to extract flavonoids from grapefruit peel. The impact of solution pH and desorption conditions on extraction efficiency was investigated. In addition, Fourier transforms infrared spectroscopy, thermogravimetry, UV-visible spectroscopy, and scanning electron microscopy were used to characterize the carbon nanotubes. After five cycles, the desorption percentage of flavonoids was 82.7%. HPLC analysis indicated that naringin was the dominant flavonoid in the grapefruit extracts, followed by rutin and quercetin. Insights into the adsorption mechanism of naringin to the MWCNT-COOH were obtained using the Freundlich isotherm equation to model the results. The carbon nanotubes developed in this study offer a cost-effective and straightforward method of extracting value-added functional ingredients from food waste, thereby improving the sustainability and economic viability of the food supply.
 

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This study investigates the comparative effects of carboxyl-functionalized multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT)/water nanofluids and titanium dioxide (TiO₂) /water nanofluids in direct absorption parabolic solar collectors. To achieve this, a standard testing apparatus was constructed, and the thermal and exergy efficiencies of the collector were calculated using nanofluids at various concentrations. UV/Vis analysis was used to analyze the radiative properties of the nanofluids, and their thermal conductivity was also measured. Experiments were conducted under laminar flow conditions with flow rates of 20, 60, and 100 liters per hour and inlet temperatures of 20, 30, and 40 °C under real conditions with direct solar irradiation. The highest thermal efficiency recorded for the carbon-based nanofluid was 44.96%, while the titanium-based nanofluid achieved a thermal efficiency of 34.98%. Given the substantial improvement in efficiency compared to the base fluid (distilled water), the combined effect of using both nanofluids was also examined, resulting in a maximum thermal efficiency of 48.77%. The exergy efficiency at the highest flow rate and inlet temperature for the base fluid, TiO₂ nanofluid, MWCNT nanofluid, and the hybrid nanofluid were 2.61%, 4.98%, 6.68%, and 7.26%, respectively. The pressure drop of all nanofluids in the absorber tube ranged from 5 to 39.6 Pascals. The studied nanofluids enhance the thermal performance of the system and create low pressure drop, indicating their high efficiency in direct absorption solar collectors.