Carbon nanotube (CNT) fiber is formed by assembling millions of individual
tubes. The assembly feature provides the fiber with rich interface structures
and thus various ways of energy dissipation, as reflected by the non-zero loss
tangent (>0.028--0.045) at low vibration frequencies. A fiber containing
entangled CNTs possesses higher loss tangents than a fiber spun from aligned
CNTs. Liquid densification and polymer infiltration, the two common ways to
increase the interfacial friction and thus the fiber's tensile strength and
modulus, are found to efficiently reduce the damping coefficient. This is
because the sliding tendency between CNT bundles can also be well suppressed by
the high packing density and the formation of covalent polymer cross-links
within the fiber. The CNT/bismaleimide composite fiber exhibited the smallest
loss tangent, nearly as the same as that of carbon fibers. At a higher level of
the assembly structure, namely a multi-ply CNT yarn, the inter-fiber friction
and sliding tendency obviously influence the yarn's damping performance, and
the loss tangent can be tuned within a wide range, as similar to carbon fibers,
nylon yarns, or cotton yarns. The wide-range tunable dynamic properties allow
new applications ranging from high quality factor materials to dissipative
systems
