It is of great significance for saving resources and
protecting
the environment to endow rubber with excellent recycling ability.
Recyclable and self-healing ENR/BN-COOH/GO nanocomposites were prepared
through dynamic covalent crosslinking between epoxidized natural rubber
(ENR) and carboxylated boron nitride (BN-COOH), and graphene oxide
(GO) was used as a reinforcing filler. The constructed dynamic β-hydroxyl
ester bond between ENR and BN-COOH resulted in the remarkable enhancement
of interfacial interaction and effective energy dissipation, which
contributed to good mechanical properties of the nanocomposites, increasing
by 116 and 79% in comparison with ENR and ENR/GO, respectively. An
exchangeable β-hydroxyl ester bond could regulate a network
topology structure via a transesterification reaction at the interface,
endowing ENR with desirable recycling and self-healing ability. Moreover,
the significant improvement of thermal conductivity for ENR/BN-COOH/GO
nanocomposites was achieved, reaching 2.853 W/(m·K) at only 6
wt % BN-COOH content, indicating the formation of effective thermal
conductive paths via the β-hydroxyl ester bond and hybrid thermal
conductive network of BN-COOH/GO. Meanwhile, the thermal conductivity
of recycled samples still maintained a high level due to the construction
of the stable thermal conductive network. Such a facile strategy exhibits
a promising perspective in preparing recyclable and highly thermal
conductive rubber nanocomposites for applications in efficient thermal
management fields.