Hydrogen Relaxation Process in HiPco Carbon Nanotubes Studied by Mechanical Spectroscopy

Abstract

The first mechanical spectroscopy experiments in HiPco carbon nanotubes from room temperature to 3 K revealed a thermally activated relaxation process at about 25 K for frequencies in the kHz range. The peak is due to the presence of a very mobile species performing about 103 jumps per second at the peak temperature. The activation energy obtained by the peak shift with frequency is Ea = 54.7 meV; the value of the pre-exponential factor of the Arrhenius law for the relaxation time, τ0 = 10-14 s, which is typical of point defect relaxation and suggests that the process is originated by the dynamics of hydrogen or by H complexes. The peak is much broader than a single Debye relaxation process, indicating the presence of intense elastic interactions in the highly disordered bundle structure. There are indications that the relaxation process is governed by a quantum mechanism.