Highly Thermally Conductive Yet Electrically Insulative Polycarbonate Composites with Oriented Hybrid Networks Assisted by High Shear Injection Molding

Abstract In this work, a facile strategy is proposed to construct thermal conductive network in polycarbonate (PC)/boron nitride (BN) composites via incorporating a small amount of multiwalled carbon nanotubes (CNTs) assisted by high shear injection molding process. A synergy is achieved between BN and CNTs in building thermal conductive pathways within PC, as confirmed by scanning electron microscopy observations and rheological analysis. The obtained thermal conductivities are well fitted with the Agari model, which further confirms the efficacy of constructing thermal conductive pathways within PC/BN/CNT composites. The thermal conductivity of PC/BN 30 wt%/CNT 2 wt% composite reaches as high as 2.05 W mK −1 , which is ≈832% and 45.4% higher than that of pure PC and PC/BN 30 wt% composite, respectively. In addition, PC/BN/CNT composites exhibit excellent electrical insulation, low dielectric properties as well as reasonable mechanical performance, which show potential applications in advanced engineering fields.