Tuning the Thermal Conductivity of the Amorphous PAA Polymer via Vapor-Phase Infiltration

Viet Phuong Nguyen; Duckjong Kim; Seung-Mo Lee

doi:10.1021/acsomega.1c04233

Tuning the Thermal Conductivity of the Amorphous PAA Polymer via Vapor-Phase Infiltration

ACS Omega. 2021 Oct 21;6(43):29054-29059. doi: 10.1021/acsomega.1c04233. eCollection 2021 Nov 2.

Authors

Viet Phuong Nguyen^{1

2}, Duckjong Kim³, Seung-Mo Lee^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Nanomechanics, Korea Institute of Machinery and Materials (KIMM), 156 Gajeongbuk-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 34103, South Korea.
² Nano Mechatronics, Korea University of Science and Technology (UST), 217 Gajeong-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 34113, South Korea.
³ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Gyeongsang National University, 171 Jang-dong, Yousung-gu, Jinju 52828, South Korea.

Abstract

The thermal properties of the polymer, together with mechanical stability, have been one of the key engineering factors to be considered for various applications. Here, we engineered the thermal conductivity of the amorphous poly(acrylic acid) (PAA) polymer by vapor-phase infiltration (VPI), which has usually occurred during the atomic layer deposition process. We observed that the VPI causes metal infiltration (e.g., Al and Zn) into the amorphous PAA polymer, which noticeably increases the thermal conductivity of the PAA polymer. From spectroscopy analysis and density functional theory simulations, we found that the carboxyl groups (-COOH) in PAA are notably modified and the bonding states of carbon and oxygen are significantly altered by the infiltrated metal. The newly formed Al-mediated bonds likely provide continuous phonon propagation pathways, thereby enhancing the thermal conductance. We believe that VPI could be a simple and useful way to engineer the thermal properties of various polymeric materials.