Carbon nanotubes were first discovered in 1952 by Radushkevich and Lukyanovich, although their structure and properties were not fully characterized until later. Several methods have been used to synthesize carbon nanotubes since the 1970s, including arc discharge, laser ablation, and chemical vapor deposition. Carbon nanotubes exist in single-walled and multi-walled forms and have a variety of properties that make them suitable for applications such as electronics, optics, energy storage and more.

1. Carbon Nanotubes
Introduction and some basics

2. History of Carbon Nanotubes
After a while a second appearance of hollow carbon fibers
with nanometer-scale diameters was made by Oberlin, Endo,
and Koyama in 1976 using a vapor growth technique.
Although Sumio Iijima considered the god father of
carbon nanotubes, but there were earlier researches on
carbon nanotubes.
The first appearance of carbon nanotubes of diameter 50 nm
were published in Soviet Journal of Physical Chemistry by
Radushkevich and Lukyanovich at 1952.

3. A U.S. patent for the production of "cylindrical discrete carbon fibrils" was issued
by Howard G. Tennent in 1987.
John Abrahamson showed an evidence of carbon nanotubes produced by arc
discharge, which was published at the 14th Biennial Conference of Carbon at Penn
State University, in 1979.
After that in 1981, a group of soviet scientists suggested that their “Carbon multi-
layer tubular crystals” were formed by rolling graphene layers into cylinders by
using TEM images and XRD patterns, the result of chemical and structural
characterization of carbon nano particles produced by a thermo catalytically
disproportionate of carbon monoxide
At 2006 an editorial was written by Marc Monthioux and Vladimir Kuznetsov in
the journal Carbon has described the origin of the carbon nanotubes

4. Morphology of Carbon
nanotubes
CNTs classified into single walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) or multi walled
carbon nanotubes (MWNTs).
Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are allotropes of carbon, a 2-
D sheet of carbon atoms; each carbon atom has three
nearest neighbors. ‘Rolling’ sheets of graphite into
cylinders forms carbon nanotubes.
It is visualized as rolled hexagonal carbon networks
capped by pentagonal carbon rings.

5. They could be present as armchair, zigzag and chiral shape
Morphology of Carbon
nanotubesMWNTs are closed graphite
tubules rolled like a graphite sheet
of diameters range between 2-25
nm and distance between sheets
(D-lattice) about 0.34 nm.
On the other SWNTs is single
seamlessly rolled graphite sheet of
diameter about 1.4 nm.

6. Properties of carbon nanotubes

7. Applications

11. Techniques used to synthesis CNTs
1- Arc Discharge
2- laser ablation
3- chemical vapor deposition
5-spray pyrolysis
4-plasma chemical vapor deposition

12. Factors affecting synthesis of CNTs
1) Precursors
2) Catalysts
3) Temperature
4) Substrate

13. Characterization required to prove the presence of CNTs
1. Field Emission microscope (FESEM)
2. Transmission Electronic Microscopy
3. Raman Spectroscopy