Structural and Thermal Properties Investigation of Stearic Acid Dispersed Fe₃O₄/TiO₂ Nanocomposites for Thermal Energy Storage

Abstract

In this paper, a series of magnetic Stearic acid (Sa)/Fe3O4/TiO2 nanocomposites were synthesized as a functional phase change materials through a two step methods; sol gel method followed by dispersion technique. Fe3O4/TiO2 nanocomposites were first synthesized by varying the molar ratio of Fe3O4:TiO2 from 1:1 to 1:5 followed by dispersing the synthesized Fe3O4/TiO2 nanocomposites in stearic acid (Sa). The structural properties were confirmed by X-ray diffractometer (XRD), while their chemical compositions were determined from energy dispersive X-ray (EDX). The molecular interaction were detected by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR). Thermal storage capability such as latent heat and specific heat were detected by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) while high thermal reliability of their phase change performance were detected by thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) experiment. The result shows that the incorporation of nanocomposites Fe3O4/TiO2 enhance the latent heat as well as heat capacity of phase change materials.