Encouraging mechanical reinforcement in polycarbonate nanocomposite films via incorporation of melt blending-prepared polycarbonate-graft-graphene oxide

In this work, we are looking for a facile way to solve the dissatisfactory compatibility of graphene oxide (GO) with polycarbonate (PC) and prepare a sort of PC/GO nanocomposite possessing satisfactory mechanical properties. Graft modification of GO was conveniently achieved by transesterification reaction during melt blending process between GO and PC. Afterwards, PC nanocomposite films were fabricated via solvent casting method. The prepared PC-graft-GO achieved uniform distribution in the PC matrix and it was found to be a high-efficient reinforcing nanofiller, up to 49% increment in tensile strength and 47% increment in Young’s Modulus of PC nanocomposite films were observed at a content of 1.0 wt% PC-graft-GO. The reinforcement was caused not only by the bearing effect of GO layers itself but also by the nucleating crystallization effect of the PC-graft-GO, further studies indicated that PC-graft-GO could serve as a nucleating agent and induce the crystallization of PC during solvent casting preparation.