Fabrication and thermally conductive properties of functionalized SiC nanowires/liquid crystal epoxy composites

Highly thermally-conductive polymer-based composites have important application value in the field of electronic equipment. Based on the “intrinsic-filled” synergistic effect, the liquid crystal epoxy functionalized SiC nanowires (SiCNWs-LCE)/liquid crystal epoxy composites with low filling amount and high thermal conductivity were prepared by the liquid phase blending method, using the synthesized intrinsic thermally-conductive liquid crystal epoxy as matrix and SiCNWs-LCE as highly thermally-conductive fillers. The chemical structures, crystallization behaviors of the liquid crystal epoxy and microstructures, chemical structures and thermal stability of the functionalized SiCNWs were analyzed. The influences of SiCNWs-LCE content on the thermal conductivity and thermal stability of the SiCNWs-LCE/liquid crystal epoxy composites were investigated in detail. The results show that the SiCNWs functionalized by silane coupling agent and liquid crystal epoxy have good dispersibility. The “intrinsic-filled” synergistic effect endows the SiCNWs-LCE/liquid crystal epoxy composite with excellent thermal conduc-tive properties. The thermal conductivity of SiCNWs-LCE/liquid crystal epoxy composites increases with the SiCNWs-LCE content. Compared with the pure liquid crystal epoxy resin, the SiCNWs-LCE/liquid crystal epoxy composites exhibit an increased thermal conductivity from 0.33 W/(m·K) to 0.72 W/(m·K) with an improvement of 118%.