Superior performance of manganese oxide/multi-walled carbon nanotubes polymer actuator over ruthenium oxide/multi-walled carbon nanotubes and single-walled carbon nanotubes

The electrochemical and electromechanical properties of poly(vinylidene fluoride-co-hexafluoropropylene) actuators developed using multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT)-ionic liquid gel electrode containing manganese oxide (MnO2) were compared with those using ionic gels with only-MWCNTs, with MWCNTs and ruthenium oxide (RuO2) or with only-single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNTs). The double-layer capacitance of the MWCNT electrode containing MnO2 was larger than the one with the MWCNT electrode containing RuO2, only-MWCNTs or only-SWCNTs. Furthermore. the MWCNT electrode containing MnO2 exceeded the performance of the other three actuators in terms of both strain and maximum generated stress. Both MWCNTs and MnO2 were required to produce large strain and quick response actuators that surpassed the performance of the polymer actuator containing only-SWCNTs. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.