Beaded silicon carbide nanochains via carbothermal reduction of carbonaceous silica xerogel

Novel silicon carbide nanostructures, beaded nanochains, are prepared from the carbothermal reduction of a carbonaceous silica xerogel with cetyltrimethylammonium bromide and lanthanum nitrate as additives. The nanochains consist of a stem with a diameter of about 50 nm and uniform beads with diameters of 100-200 nm. It is demonstrated that the tensile strength of an epoxy composite filled with the SiC nanochains improves significantly due to the unusual morphology of the nanochains.