US manufactures nanotube reinforced ceramics

It is reported that in January 2004, materials scientists at the University of California, Davis, USA, produced ceramic materials reinforced with carbon nanotubes. This new material is much stronger than ordinary ceramics, can conduct electricity, and is both thermally conductive and thermally insulating.
The fracture toughness of the new material is five times that of conventional alumina, which is 10 trillion times More conductive than pure aluminum oxide and seven times that of previous ceramics made with nanotubes. It also has interesting heat-conducting properties, namely that it conducts heat in only one direction, that is, in the direction of the arrangement of the nanotubes, but it can reflect heat when forming an appropriate angle with the nanotubes, thus making it a thermal insulation for manufacturing. Film of good material.
Professor Amia Mukherjee, head of the research group and professor of chemical engineering and materials science at the University of California, Davis, said that ceramic materials are hard and resistant to heat and corrosion, and are very useful in coatings such as turbine blades.