Hydrogen bonded interface self-assembled ZnFe2O4@PDA@Ti3C2TX MXene composites with three-dimensional core/shell/shell structure for ultrathin high-performance electromagnetic wave absorbers

Two-dimensional Ti3C2Tx (MXene) nanosheets with excellent electrical conductivity, a vast range of functional groups, and abundant surface defects reveal tremendous potential for electromagnetic wave (EMW) absorption. Nonetheless, the excessive conductivity of pure MXene may result in mismatches of electromagnetic parameters and an inability to meet impedance matching requirements. Here, a facile self-assembly strategy was used to assemble MXene with ZnFe2O4 (ZFO) through polydopamine (PDA) to form [email protected]@MXene (ZFPM) core/ shell/ shell composites, which solved this problem. By strong hydrogen bonding, MXene was successfully affixed to the interface of [email protected], forming a core/shell/shell structure, in which ZFO is the core, and PDA and MXene are the shells. Furthermore, the influence of MXene content on the EMW absorption performance for ZFPM composites was also investigated. Remarkably, the ZFPM composites containing 20 wt. % MXene exhibit strong EMW absorption, achieving an optimum reflection loss of −53.0 dB (99.9995 % absorption of EMWs) at a matched thickness of only 1.5 mm. The excellent EMW absorption performance is mainly attributed to the synergistic effect related to the core/shell/shell structure of the ZFPM composites and the magnetic dielectric loss. These results demonstrate that ZFPM composites are attractive candidates for EMW absorption applications and offer new ideas for the design of magnetic MXene-based absorbers.