Graphene Thermoplastic Polymer Composites for Electromagnetic Interference Shielding

Going on with research and technological development, human beings keep creating electronic devices to use in daily life. This entails the need for regulations to ensure the proper working of such devices in their electromagnetic environments. Regulations and standards help to ensure respecting quality expectations and safety rules. An important field to know is the one of electromagnetic compatibility. Indeed, its importance is growing day by day, especially in the automotive sector. The need for shielding against electromagnetic interference led to the usage of highly conductive materials such as metals. However, their applications must be limited due to environmental and economic aspects. This pointed out the need for lighter, environment-friendly, and cost-effective materials to substitute the heavier and more expensive ones. This project aims to describe a short part of the ongoing project between the BNL (Bozlar Nanoscience Lab) and SABIC. Following the growing trend for creating composite materials for EMI shielding, their collaboration aims to build a groundbreaking material based on graphene. Going from the literature review to the model setup and some mechanical tests the results are promising. Indeed, graphene inclusions below 15 wt % seem to ensure the required values of shielding. These are values that can compete with the recent studies that have been taken on. Such a material could represent a turning point in the electromagnetic field leading to cheaper, lighter, and still effective shielding. However, the study has to be followed up to validate the model with the experiments, according to standards.