Single-wall carbon nanotube fiber non-woven fabrics with a high electrothermal heating response

Carbon nanotube(CNT)fibers have great promise for constructing multifunctional fabrics with high electrical conductivity,good electro-heating ability,excellent flexibility,and a low density.However,the inter-fiber contacts in the fabric greatly reduce these advantages and limit their application.Herein,a simple pressure-fusing method to fabricate single-wall CNT(SWCNT)fiber non-woven fabrics(NWFs)that are composed of interconnected SWCNT fibers with fused joints is reported,which have good flexibility,a low density of 0.46 g/cm^(3),a high electrical conductivity of 3.7×10^(5)S/m,and a record high specific electrical conductivity of 803(S·m^(2))/kg.They also showed excellent electrical heating ability,so that a temperature of~160℃was rapidly reached at a low voltage of 2 V.Combined with their low density,the SWCNT fiber NWFs are promising for use as a heating unit for low temperature battery protection and de-icing applications.