title: Three-phase textile nanocomposites: significant improvements in strength, toughness and ductility.
abstract: It is well established that in-plane tensile properties of unidirectional microfiber-reinforced composites are not significantly influenced by addition of carbon nanotubes to the matrix. This is because the principal effect of the nanotubes is to enhance the matrix dominated (out-of-plane) properties. Here we report that the above situation changes when nanotubes are incorporated into woven-fabric (textile) composites. We report up to 200% increase in strain-to-break and 180% increase in toughness under in-plane tensile load with approximately 0.05% weight of nanotube additives. We attribute this effect to the geometrical arrangement of the micro-fibers and the critical role of the pure-matrix-block in textile composites.
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical, Aerospace and Nuclear Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY 12180, USA.
authors.forename: Iti
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Srivastava
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Proper
authors.forename: Mohammad A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Rafiee
authors.forename: Nikhil
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Koratkar