PREPARATION AND PROPERTIES OF POLYSTYRENE/MW-CNT COMPOSITES

Abstract

Polystyrene/MWCNT (Multi-walled Carbon-Nanotube) composites were fabricated by direct melt mixing method. The electrical and structural properties of the composite with different weight percentages (0.01, 0.10, 0.15, 0.20, 0.50, 1.00 and 3.00) wt % of dopant was studied using Keithley two-point probe and GBC EMMA X-ray diffractormeter respectively. The dimension of the samples is 100mmx100mmx3mm. At room temperature, the results showed significant increase in electrical conductivity value from 0.03x10-6 - 1.7x10-6(?m)-1 when the filler weight percentage is increase from 0.01% to 3.00%. The conductivity of the composites was also observed to increase as temperature increases. The percolation threshold was observed to occur at a very low loading of 0.10%. The structural result showed that the amorphous structure of polystyrene was converted to crystalline nature as the different weight % of filler is added. It was also observed that the crystallite size of the composites decreased as the filler weight% is increased.