Reduced Graphene Oxide Aerogels with Uniformly Self-Assembled Polyaniline Nanosheets for Electromagnetic Absorption

Abstract

Reduced graphene oxide (RGO)/polyaniline (PANI) composite aerogels (GPAs) with uniformly distributed PANI nanosheets were prepared by a facile self-assembly way. The fabricated hybrids present a cross-linked three-dimensional (3D) porous network, and RGO sheets were covered by PANI sheets with controlled content. The unique architecture efficiently reduced agglomeration of RGO and enhanced the conductive loss of the material to incident wave. Specifically, the GPA composite with 50 wt % PANI showed excellent electromagnetic wave absorption capacity; the largest reflection loss (RL) value reached −48 dB with fill loading of only 3%, and the qualified bandwidth (RL ≤ −10 dB) covered the entire Ku band (12–18 GHz). The study is expected to pave the way to prepare wide qualified bandwidth and lightweight graphene-based electromagnetic wave absorption hybrids with controlled microstructure.