Covalent grafting of triazine derivatives onto graphene oxide for preparation of epoxy composites with improved interfacial and mechanical properties

Interface interactions are the important problems in improving the mechanical properties of graphene and polymer composites. In this work, a simple method is proposed to prepare epoxy composites with admirable properties through constructing dendrimers with cyanuric chloride (TCT) and diethylenetriamine (DETA) onto graphene oxide (GO) surface. The FTIR, XRD, XPS, Raman spectroscopy, SEM and TEM were used to confirm the successful grafting of TCT and DETA molecules onto the surface of GO. The interfacial adhesion between GO–TCT–DETA and epoxy resin is enhanced due to the formation of a strong chemical bond between the amino group on the GO surface and the epoxy resins. The tensile and flexural strength of GO–TCT–DETA/epoxy composites have considerable improvement (40.79 and 48.56%) compared with that of epoxy resin due to stronger interfacial interaction. In addition, the strengthening mechanism and dispersion of GO–TCT–DETA in epoxy matrix were also demonstrated.