Study of Nickel Catalysts Deposited by Using the Electroless Plating Method and Growth of the Multiwall Carbon Nanotubes

In this study, the electroless plating has been successfully applied for nickel catalyst layer and the multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) grown by chemical vapor deposition (CVD). Sulfuric acid solution was used as buffer to adjust and maintain pH value of electroless plating solution on 4.5. The structural, element, and quality of MWNTs were investigated with field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM), X-ray diffraction patterns (XRD), energy dispersive spectrometer (EDS) and Raman spectrometer. From the FE-SEM image, it showed that the density of MWNTs increased as the deposition time of nickel catalyst layer increased. This result caused by the formation of nickel nucleation become rich as the immersion of the substrate in electroless plating solution was longer, and this benefited the growth of carbon nanotubes. The Raman analysis demonstrated that the ID/IG ratio of MWNTs decreases as the deposition times of nickel catalyst layer increases, indicating that more graphene MWNTs structures were formed.