Annealing effect on thermal conductivity and microhardness of carbon nanotube containing Se₈₀Te₁₆Cu₄glassy composites

This study deals with the effect of thermal annealing on structural/microstructural, thermal and mechanical behavior of pristine Se 80 Te 16 Cu 4 and carbon nanotubes (CNTs) containing Se 80 Te 16 Cu 4 glassy composites. Pristine Se 80 Te 16 Cu 4 , 3 and 5 wt%CNTs-Se 80 Te 16 Cu 4 glassy composites are annealed in the vicinity of glass transition temperature to onset crystallization temperature (340–380 K). X-ray diffraction (XRD) pattern revealed formation of polycrystalline phases of hexagonal CuSe and trigonal selenium. The indexed d -values in XRD patterns are in well conformity with the d -values obtained after the indexing of the ring pattern of selected area electron diffraction pattern of TEM images. The SEM investigation exhibited that the grain size of the CNTs containing Se 80 Te 16 Cu 4 glassy composites increased with increasing annealing temperature and decreased at further higher annealing temperature. Thermal conductivity, microhardness exhibited a substantial increase with increasing annealing temperature of 340–360 K and slightly decreases for 380 K. The variation of thermal conductivity and microhardness can be explained by cross-linking formation and voids reduction.