Patent ID: 8475698

Claim:
A method of making a carbon nanopipe and ensemble of carbon nanopipes, comprising the steps of: flowing a carbon precursor over silica fibers and thereby depositing a durable graphitizable carbon coating of tunable thickness of about 10-500 nm onto the silica fibers by concomitant pyrolysis at about 1000° C.; and etching away the silica fibers to yield a three-dimensional mat of electronically networked, hollow carbon tubules; controlling by a two-stage gas manifold the atmosphere of the step of depositing wherein stage 1 is purging the reaction chamber with pure argon flowing at 100 mL min −1 as measured at the exhaust and stage 2 is introducing the carbon precursor; wherein the silica fibers are three-dimensionally interwoven or physically entangled fibers having diameters of about <1 μm; wherein the carbon precursor is selected from the group consisting of benzene, naphthalene, and acetonitrile; wherein the tubule has an inner pipe diameter that can be determined by the diameter of the silica fiber and a wall thickness defined by the depth of the carbon coating; wherein the carbon precursor is a vapor in Ar(g) as it flows over the silica fibers; wherein the step of flowing a carbon precursor over silica fibers and thereby depositing a durable graphitizable carbon coating of tunable thickness occurs at a rate of about 10-15 nm min −1 .