(403c) New Method to Determine Micropore Volume and Surface Area of Single-Walled Carbon Nanotubes

We have developed a microporosity and surface area estimation method that is specific to single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs). Typically, micropore volume of adsorbents can be determined by the t-plot method, where the statistical thickness, t, of adsorbed layer is a function of the adsorbed amount, and is estimated by several equations such as de Boer equation, Halsey equation and Carbon Black equation. The t-plot method is one of the most common and versatile method. The estimated micropore volume is often specific to a model and to the segment of adsorption isotherm that is fitted to that model. SWNTs are relatively new adsorbents because of which applicability of these models to carbon nanotubes needs to be evaluated. We have developed a technique that compares experimental N2 adsorption isotherm (77 K) of a sample with grand canonical Monte Carlo (GCMC) simulation isotherms of N2 on the external surface of SWNT bundles (10-6