Ultrasound–assisted synthesis and characterization of polymethyl methacrylate/reduced graphene oxide nanocomposites

This article reports ultrasound–assisted synthesis of polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA)/reduced graphene oxide (RGO) nanocomposites by in situ emulsion polymerization coupled with in situ reduction of graphene oxide. The thermal degradation kinetics of the nanocomposites was also assessed with Criado and Coats‐Redfern methods. Intense microconvection generated by ultrasound and cavitation results in uniform dispersion of RGO in the polymer matrix, which imparts markedly higher physical properties to resulting nanocomposites at low (≤1.0 wt %) RGO loadings, as compared to nanocomposites synthesized with mechanical stirring. Some important properties of the PMMA/RGO nanocomposites synthesized with sonication (with various RGO loadings) are: glass transition temperature (0.4 wt %) = 124.5°C, tensile strength (0.4 wt %) = 40.4 MPa, electrical conductivity (1.0 wt %) = 2 × 10^?7 S/cm, electromagnetic interference shielding effectiveness (1.0 wt %) = 3.3 dB. Predominant thermal degradation mechanism of nanocomposites (1.0 wt % RGO) is 1D diffusion with activation energy of 111.3 kJ/mol. © 2017 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 64: 673–687, 2018