Grafting of Polyesteronto Graphene for Electrically and Thermally Conductive Composites.

Many reported polymer/graphene composites, even somewith excellent graphene dispersion, do not possess impressive conductivity,which may be due to the failure in forming interconnected conductivepaths. In this work, a kind of bio-based polyester (BE) is synthesizedby polycondensation between plant-derived diols and diacids. It isthen grafted onto graphene oxide (GO) via the easterification betweenhydroxyls of BE and carboxyls of GO. Subsequently, the grafted GOis subjected to reduce by vitamin C. Because of the presence of terminalhydroxyl group in both ends of the BE chains and multiple carboxylgroups on GO, the grafts form specific spatial interconnection structurein BE matrix. The resulting BE/graphene composites possess impressivelow threshold percolation of electrical conductivity, in combinationof high thermal conductivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]