Enhanced dielectric and thermal properties of Zn/PVDF composites by tailoring core@double-shell structured Zn particles

In this study, poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) composites containing a [email protected] structured zinc (Zn) filler (i.e., [email protected]@ZnO) were synthesized. The primary focus is to investigate the effect of double shell on the polarization mechanism of composites by analyzing the dielectric properties and fitting the experimental data with a Havriliak–Negami (HN) expression. The results verify that the [email protected]@ZnO/PVDF composites exhibit prominently enhanced dielectric constant, suppressed loss and conductivity over pure PVDF and the pristine Zn/PVDF thanks to induced multiple polarizations generated in the [email protected] configuration. The fitting curves reveal that the multiple polarizations are derived from the combined contributions of the α relaxation of PVDF, fast intra-particle polarization and slow inter-particle polarization. Furthermore, the thermal conductivity of [email protected]@ZnO/PVDF composites is enhanced by changing the amorphous ZnCH to crystalline ZnO shell promoting phonon transport. This work opens a new avenue to obtain comprehensively good performances of dielectric composites for potential application in microelectronics.