The Preparation, Morphology and Electrical Properties of Polystyrene/Graphene Nanocomposite Foams Using Supercritical Carbon Dioxide

Abstract

In this work, polystyrene/ graphene nanocomposite foams were prepared using supercritical carbon dioxide. Chemically reduced graphene oxide were incorporated into PS using latex mixing. Subsequently, the nanocomposites were foamed with supercritical CO2, the foaming temperature is varied. The morphology and electrical properties of the foamed samples were discussed. It is suggested that foaming temperature has significant influence on the morphology of foams. For those samples foamed at higher temperature, foams have thin cell wall and low density even when the content of graphene is relatively high, while they possess good electrical conductivity, may be used as light weight functional materials.