Superb electromagnetic wave-absorbing composites based on large-scale graphene and carbon nanotube films

Jinsong Li; Weibang Lu; Jonghwan Suhr; Hang Chen; John Q Xiao; Tsu-Wei Chou

doi:10.1038/s41598-017-02639-7

Superb electromagnetic wave-absorbing composites based on large-scale graphene and carbon nanotube films

Sci Rep. 2017 May 24;7(1):2349. doi: 10.1038/s41598-017-02639-7.

Authors

Jinsong Li^{1

2}, Weibang Lu³, Jonghwan Suhr⁴, Hang Chen⁵, John Q Xiao⁵, Tsu-Wei Chou⁶

Affiliations

¹ School of Physics and Nuclear Energy Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing, 100191, China.
² Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, 19716, United States.
³ Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou, 215123, China.
⁴ Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, Sungkyunkwan University, Suwon, 440-746, Republic of Korea.
⁵ Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, 19716, United States.
⁶ Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, 19716, United States. chou@udel.edu.

Abstract

Graphene has sparked extensive research interest for its excellent physical properties and its unique potential for application in absorption of electromagnetic waves. However, the processing of stable large-scale graphene and magnetic particles on a micrometer-thick conductive support is a formidable challenge for achieving high reflection loss and impedance matching between the absorber and free space. Herein, a novel and simple approach for the processing of a CNT film-Fe₃O₄-large scale graphene composite is studied. The Fe₃O₄ particles with size in the range of 20-200 nm are uniformly aligned along the axial direction of the CNTs. The composite exhibits exceptionally high wave absorption capacity even at a very low thickness. Minimum reflection loss of -44.7 dB and absorbing bandwidth of 4.7 GHz at -10 dB are achieved in composites with one-layer graphene in six-layer CNT film-Fe₃O₄ prepared from 0.04 M FeCl₃. Microstructural and theoretical studies of the wave-absorbing mechanism reveal a unique Debye dipolar relaxation with an Eddy current effect in the absorbing bandwidth.