Carbon nanotubes decorated with gold, platinum and rhodium clusters by   injection of colloidal solutions into the post-discharge of a RF atmospheric   plasma
  In this paper, we present a new, simple, robust and efficient technique to decorate multi-wall carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) with metal nanoparticles. As case studies, Au, Pt and Rh nanoparticles are grafted onto MWCNTs by spraying a colloidal solution into the post-discharge of an atmospheric argon or argon/oxygen RF plasma. The method that we introduce here is different from those usually described in the literature, since the treatment is operated at atmospheric pressure, allowing the realization in only one step of the surface activation and the deposition processes. We demonstrate experimentally that the addition of oxygen gas in the plasma increases significantly the amount of grafted metal nanoparticles. Moreover, TEM pictures clearly show that the grafted nanoparticles are well controlled in size. 
Nicolas Claessens, Fr\'ed\'eric Demoisson, Thierry Dufour, Ali   Mansour, Alexandre Felten, J\'er\^ome Guillot, Jean-Jacques...
cond-mat.mes-hall cond-mat.mtrl-sci