Research Article Open Access

Augmentation of Thermo-physical Properties of Porous Polymer Composite Film by Sonication

Abstract

The systematic experimental design was pertained to optimize the effects of the concentration of activated carbon, on the thermo-physical properties (porosity, thermal degradation) of Porous Polymer Composite Film (PPCF). In this study, Linear Low-Density Polyethylene (LLDPE) of roto and film grade was used for synthesizing PPCF via cavitationassisted solidification route with varying wt% of Activated Carbon (AC) in the polymer matrix. The cavitation effect was given by a water bath sonicator subjected to a particular frequency and sonication time. The fabricated flat sheet PPCF was characterized by using Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope (FESEM), Differential Thermal Analysis (DTA), Thermo Gravimetric analysis (TGA) and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) analysis to establish a correlation between the filler concentration and their structural, morphological and thermal attributes. Among two different grade matrix materials (roto and film), roto grade LLDPE is unsuitable for PPCF making since it shows agglomerations, whereas low activated carbon concentration (5 wt%) shows a better result in film grade with conformal coverage. The activation energy decreases with increasing filler concentration. Sonication helps in de-agglomeration, uniform dispersion of the filler in matrices with reduction of mean pore diameter of LLDPEF 2.2 and LLDPER 2.2 from 0.26 μm to 0.15 μm (42.3%) and 1.02 μm to 0.54 μm (47.05%) along with enhancement in porosity by 48.5% and 13.84% respectively. Apart from gas separation/ sensing, catalysis, energy storage, photonics, these fabricated PPCF can be used as micro-perforated sound absorption panel.

Debashis Panda, Sanjay Kumar Rout and Payodhar Padhi

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