(779a) Characterization of Functional Carbon Nanotubes By Titration

As we all known, since its discovery, CNT has been an attractive supporting material of catalyst. Before it can be used for catalyst supports, we must functionalized it first. However the functional groups on the carbon nanotubes can be very complicated, including hydroxyl groups, carbonyl groups, carboxyl groups and so on. To characterize the functional groups can be difficult. All of the traditional methods have their problems. Some are not capable for quantitive measurement like RI, TGA, TPD, Raman, TEM. Some need a lot of sample and time consuming like Chemical Derivatization, Bohem titration. Or some is very subjective due to analysis process like XPS and XAFS. Here we introduce using the simple acid-base titration to characterize the functionalized carbon nanotubes. By using principle component analysis of the titration data, we can calculate the density of certain functional groups. The result is compared with XANES and XPS for both C and O edges.