Patent ID: 8685287

Claim:
A method of making a mechanically robust, electrically conductive ultralow-density carbon nanotube-based aerogel, comprising the steps of: dispersing carbon nanotubes in an aqueous media or other media to form a suspension, adding reactants and catalyst to said suspension to create a reaction mixture, wherein the reaction mixture is substantially free of any surfactant for said carbon nanotubes, curing said reaction mixture to form a wet gel, drying said wet gel at to produce a dry gel, and pyrolyzing said dry gel a temperature above 600Â° C. under an inert atmosphere to produce the mechanically robust, electrically conductive ultralow-density carbon nanotube-based aerogel, wherein the mechanically robust, electrically conductive ultralow-density carbon nanotube-based aerogel comprises a network of carbon nanotubes crosslinked by carbon nanoparticles.