Transient thermal characterization of micro/submicroscale polyacrylonitrile wires

In this work, the thermal diffusivity of single polyacrylonitrile (PAN) wires with diameters from 4.62 μm down to 324 nm is measured by using our recently developed transient electro-thermal technique. The wires span from 23 μm to 126.2 μm in our measurement. Since PAN wires are dielectric, a thin Au film is coated on the surface of the wires to make them conductive. In the experiment, a step current (with ∼2 μs rising time) is fed to the sample. The sample is heated and takes a certain time to reach its steady thermal state. The temperature rising response of the sample is sensed by measuring the resistance change of the thin Au coating. From the average temperature evolution of the sample, the thermal diffusivity can be extracted. Three PAN wires with different diameters are synthesized using the electro-spinning technique and are measured to obtain their thermal diffusivities (around 1.53×10-7 m2/s), which are slightly smaller than the bulk value.