Controlled liquid crystal behavior of graphene oxide/single walled carbon nanotube mixtures for continuous multi hole wet spinning.

Liquid-crystalline (LC)-spinning of graphene oxide (GO) is a promising method for producing conducting fibres. However, achieving continuous wet-spinning via a multi-hole spinneret with organic solvent-based spinning dopes remains challenging, primarily because of the limitations in coagulation without ion crosslinking agents, such as Ca and Fe. In this study, we report the colloidal engineering of an LC GO-based spinning dope with highly oxidised single-walled carbon nanotubes (ox-SWCNTs) for continuous multi-hole wet-spinning. With 10 wt% ox-SWCNTs, GO retains its LC phase using a controlled solvent exchange strategy in N-methyl-2-pyrrolidone, which is a prerequisite for wet-spinning. The heterogeneous mixing of the ox-SWCNTs in the LC GO phase allows coagulation in ethyl acetate within a few seconds, which is facilitated by the rapid exchange of the dope solvent and coagulant through the ox-SWCNT networks. Moreover, ox-SWCNTs are utilised to modify fibre surfaces for applications in textile supercapacitors. The GO/ox-SWCNT@ox-SWCNT fibres exhibit an enhanced specific capacity of 138 mF/cm. This study presents a promising approach for the continuous wet-spinning of nanocarbon materials through a multi-hole spinneret for textile electronics, addressing the challenges associated with dispersion in colloidal nanocarbon systems.