Synthesis of in situ grown CNTs on MOF-derived Ni@CNT with tailorable microstructures toward regulation of electromagnetic wave absorption performance

Metal-Organic framework (MOF) derivatives have been applied as electromagnetic wave absorption (EMA) materials in recent years. Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) can achieve in situ growth on the surface of MOF derivatives. However, there is limited research on the EMA performance by regulating the morphology of the in situ grown CNTs. In this work, we prepared MOF-derived Ni@carbon nanotubes (Ni@CNT) with controllable length of CNTs by solvothermal and simple one-step pyrolysis method and revealed the CNT growth mechanism. We further investigated the effect of in situ grown CNT morphology on electromagnetic parameters and EMA performance. In situ grown CNTs of similar length on the surface of MOF derivatives lead to similar electromagnetic parameters. When the length of CNTs is short, the relaxation strength ($\Delta \epsilon ={\epsilon }_s-{\epsilon }_{\infty }$) is high, leading to excellent microwave absorption performance. For Ni@CNT-600, the reflection loss of −44.4 dB can be achieved at merely 1.72 mm. Finite element (FE) simulation was used to evaluate the EMA mechanism of different samples by calculating electric field and polarization strength. This work has explored the electromagnetic wave absorption performance from the perspective of microstructural tailoring, helpful for understanding the unique role of the in situ grown CNTs on the surface of MOF derivatives and investigating the ultra-thin electromagnetic wave absorption materials.