Effect of vanadium pentoxide on the mechanical, thermal, and electrical properties of poly(vinyl alcohol)/vanadium pentoxide nanocomposites

摘要

In this study, we examined the effect of vanadium pentoxide (V _2O_5) on the mechanical, thermal, and morphological properties of poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA)/V_2O_5 nanocomposites. The PVA/V_2O_5 nanocomposites were prepared by solution mixing, followed by film casting. The results show that the Young's moduli of the resulting nanocomposites films were higher than the pure PVA modulus with increasing V_2O_5 content, and it reached a maximum point at about 0.4 wt % V_2O_5 content at 8.55 GPa. The tensile strength and stress at break increased with increasing V _2O_5 content. The addition of V_2O_5 did not affect the melting temperature. The crystallization temperatures of PVA were significantly changed with increasing V_2O_5 content. The 5% weight loss degradation temperature of the nanocomposites was measured by thermogravimetric analysis. The degradation temperatures of the V _2O_5 nanocomposites increased with increasing filler content and were higher than the degradation temperature of pure PVA; this showed a lower thermal stability compared to those of the nanocomposites. The results show that the thermal stability increased with the incorporation of V_2O_5 nanoparticles. The dielectric constant of PVA had a tendency to improve when the dispersion of particles was effective. The morphology of the surfaces the nanocomposites was examined by scanning electron microscopy. We observed that the dispersion of the V_2O_5 nanoparticles was relatively good; only few aggregations existed after the addition of the V_2O_5 nanoparticles at greater than 0.4 wt %. In perspective, the addition of 0.4 wt % V_2O_5 nanoparticles into PVA maximized the mechanical, thermal, and electrical properties.