Micromechanically-based Effective Electrical Conductivity Estimates and Experimental study for Polymer Nanocomposites: Percolation Threshold

摘要

The classical micromechanics models were modified to predict the effective electrical conductivities of composites containing multiple distinct nano-heterogeneities (nanonbers, nanospheres, nanoplatelets, voids, etc.) each with an arbitrary number of coating layers based upon either the modified Mori-Tanaka or modified self-consistent methods, where the multi-inclusion and multi-phase composite models developed by Nemat-Nasser and Hori were employed. A parametric study was performed to investigate the effect of nanoreinforcement morphology, volume fraction, orientation, and nanoreinforcement-resin interphase properties on calculated effective electrical conductivities. Predicted electrical conductivities matched experimentally measured values for a new material manufacturing processing for improving dispersion of various shaped-and dimensioned-nanofillers such as carbon nanotubes, graphenes and carbon blacks within a Cyclic Butylene Terephthalate matrix is developed, and the experimentally measured thermal conductivities of those composites are compared with the predicted values obtained from analytic micromechanics models.