pps proceeding - Abstract Preview
pps proceeding
Symposium: S02 - Polymer Blends and Alloys
Oral Presentation
 
 

Towards conductive polymer composites with strain sensing capability: the effect of conductive network morphology and interfacial interaction

Deng Hua (1)*, Du Rongni (2), Ji Mizhi (1), Duan Linyan (1), Fu Qiang (1)

(1) College of Polymer Science and Engineering, Sichuan University - Sichuan - China, (2) College of Polymer Science and Engineering, Sichuan University - Sichuan - China

Various methods have been proposed to modify the electrical property-strain sensitivity of conductive polymer composites (CPCs). Nevertheless, the range of tunable strain sensitivity is limited. In our previous studies [1-4], the effect of conductive network morphology and interfacial interaction on the strain sensing capability of CPCs based on thermoplastic elastomer have been shown to be crucial. Using various morphological control methods, such as pre-straining, thermal annealing and mixed conductive fillers etc., is shown to generate different characteristic for conductive networks. Nevertheless, a wide range of methods have been demonstrated to be effective at controlling the morphology and interface of conductive network in CPCs [1], only few have been tested for strain sensing applications. Therefore, there is a tremendous amount of needs to explore the different strain sensing behavior of different CPCs fabricated with their conductive networks modified for specific applications. In current study, we aims to investigate the effect of using polymer blends on the strain sensing behavior of CPCs based on thermoplastic elastomer. In a blend based on SBS and TPU, MWNTs are selectively distributed in SBS, TPU and both in SBS and TPU, respectively. It is observed that the composite fibres with selectively localized MWNTs show distinct different ρ-ε sensing behavior. The composite fibre with MWNTs distributed in SBS exhibits higher ρ-ε sensitivity than its counterpart with MWNTs distributed in TPU, and with MWNTs distributed in both phases, the ρ-ε sensitivity lies in between. Through various characterizations (including: SEM, Raman spectroscopy) and calculations, it is indicated that the various network morphology and interfacial interaction in these blends are responsible for the observed strain sensing behavior. 1 Deng et al, Prog. in Poly. Sci., In press,2013 2 Deng et al, Poly. Int. 2013 3 Deng et al, Small, 2013 4 Deng et al, ACS Appl. Mat.&Inter.2013