Thermal Conductivity of Epoxy Resin Reinforced with Magnesium Oxide Coated Multiwalled Carbon Nanotubes

Fei-Peng Du,Hao Tang,De-Yong Huang

doi:10.1155/2013/541823

Abstract

Magnesium oxide coated multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MgO@MWNT) were fabricated and dispersed into epoxy matrix. The microstructures of MgO@MWNT and epoxy/MgO@MWNT nanocomposites were characterized by TEM and SEM. Electrical resistivity and thermal conductivity of epoxy nanocomposites were investigated with high resistance meter and thermal conductivity meter, respectively. MgO@MWNT has core-shell structure with MgO as shell and nanotube as core, and the thickness of MgO shell is ca. 15 nm. MgO@MWNT has been dispersed well in the epoxy matrix. MgO@MWNT loaded epoxy nanocomposites still retain electrical insulation inspite of the filler content increase. However, thermal conductivity of epoxy was increased with the MgO@MWNT content increasing. When MgO@MWNT content reached 2.0 wt.%, thermal conductivity was increased by 89% compared to neat epoxy, higher than that of unmodified MWNT nanocomposites with the same loading content.

Highlights

Integrated circuit with high integration and miniaturization has resulted in a large amount of waste heat that is produced when electronic components work at high frequency
To decrease thermal resistance and enhance heat flow transporting in the interface of Carbon nanotubes (CNT) and polymer, some researches focused on the interface design between carbon nanomaterial and polymer to improve the thermal conductivity or other properties of polymer composites [10,11,12,13,14]
CNTs can improve the thermal conductivity of polymer, their excellent electrical conductive property can significantly change the electric conductivity of the polymer matrix

Summary

Introduction

Integrated circuit with high integration and miniaturization has resulted in a large amount of waste heat that is produced when electronic components work at high frequency. Polymer/CNT composites are hardly appropriate as electronic packaging materials or thermal interface materials [15, 16] To overcome this issue, coaxial cable structure of CNT coated with hyper-branched polymer or nanosize silica was added into polymer matrix via interface design method in our previous work [15, 16]. Coaxial cable structure of CNT coated with hyper-branched polymer or nanosize silica was added into polymer matrix via interface design method in our previous work [15, 16] This kind of electrical-insulating layer between polymer and CNT can restrain electronic transport properties of CNT in the composites and keep the polymer composite electrical insulation. The influence of thermal conductivity of interface layer on the composite material has been investigated

Experimental

Results and Discussion

Conclusions