Multifunctional and environmentally friendly nanocomposites between natural rubber and graphene or graphene oxide

Graphene-philic surfactants for nanocomposites in latex technology

“…This change corresponds to the formation of a filler network within the matrix for enhanced electron mobility [17,76]. The versatility of latex technology to offer low percolation threshold and relatively high conductivity immediately stimulated others to work in this area, with much success [27,38,44,61]. Also spurred on by the desire to minimize the use of organic solvents, so-called volatile organic compounds (VOCs).…”

“…Studies have reported that surfactants can mediate filler-polymer interactions and enhance the filler-tomatrix transfer properties [42,44,69,70,78], though different conclusions were reached.…”

“…to give a uniform filler dispersion. A parallel approach, but with a different polymer, was undertaken by Matos et al [44], here TEM elemental mapping of nitrogen was used to show that CTAB adhered preferentially at the edges of the rGO sheets and coalesced rubber. The ability of surfactants to alter interfacial energy is one of the driving forces for the migration towards the interface during film formation [114].…”

“…More recently, Matos et al [44] reported that the strong electrostatic interactions of negatively charged NR particles and positively charged CTAB coated graphene contributed to the significant improvement of the composite final properties. That CTAB is distributed at the edges of graphene sheets is one factor that solves the graphene -NR matrix incompatibility.…”

“…These nanocomposites can also find applications involving solvent, gas and bacterial resistance in biomedical applications, pipelines for petroleum industry and hygiene products [44]. Despite the hype, it should be considered too early to tell if graphene nanocomposites, particularly those with latex technology, will allow the current-lab-scale production to scale up to industrial levels.…”