Structural and Thermophysical Studies of Composite Na-Cobaltite Electrospun Nanofibers

Abstract

Polymeric nanofibers have been produced in the last few years by electrospinning of polymer solutions. Polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) was the selected polymer for the preparation of nanofibers. Processing parameters like flow rate, needle gauge, needle to collector distance, and molarity of the solution have been optimized during electrospinning process. Sol-gel method has been used for the preparation of thermoelectric cobaltite nanoparticles having composition NaCoO2. Sol-gel combined electrospinning technique was used to prepare the composites of the NaCoO2 with PVA nanofibers. X-ray diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) have been used for the structural analysis of the prepared samples. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was used to observe the morphology of the prepared fibers. SEM micrographs showed that, by increasing the flow rate, diameter of the fibers increased from 185 nm to 200 nm. Two-probe method and Advantageous Transient Plane Source (ATPS) were used to study the electrical and thermal transport properties, respectively. Thermal conductivity and electrical conductivity showed a direct dependence on temperature. It was observed that particles, sample has lower thermal conductivity (0.610 W/m-K) as compared to that of composite nanofibers (1.129 W/m-K). The measurements reported are novel and are useful for energy applications.