In Situ Growth of Core-Sheath Heterostructural SiC Nanowire Arrays on Carbon Fibers and Enhanced Electromagnetic Wave Absorption Performance

Large-scale core-sheath heterostructural SiC nanowires were facilely grown on the surface of carbon fibers using a one-step chemical vapor infiltration process. The as-synthesized SiC nanowires consist of single crystalline SiC cores with a diameter of similar to 30 nm and polycrystalline SiC sheaths with an average thickness of similar to 60 nm. The formation mechanisms of core sheath heterostructural SiC nanowires (SiCnws) were discussed in detail. The SiCnws-CF shows strong electromagnetic (EM) wave absorption performance with a maximum reflection loss value of -45.98 dB at 4.4 GHz. Moreover, being coated with conductive polymer polypyrrole (PPy) by a simple chemical polymerization method, the SiCnws-CF/PPy nanocomposites exhibited superior EM absorption abilities with maximum RL value of -50.19 dB at 14.2 GHz and the effective bandwidth of 6.2 GHz. The SiCnws-CF/PPy nanocomposites in this study are very promising as absorber materials with strong electromagnetic wave absorption performance.