Stabilization of PS/PLA cocontinuous blends by interfacial graphene*

Reduced graphene oxide (r-GO) is known to be effective in increasing the conductivity of cocontinuous polymer blends with a lower electrical percolation threshold. However, little is known regarding the localization and dynamics of r-GO along with morphology change during annealing. In this study, we develop a facile method to stabilize the polystyrene (PS)/polylactic acid (PLA) cocontinuous blends with r-GO jammed at interface. In this method, the non-functionalized GO is premixed with PLA via solvent method, and then reduced in-situ at 210oC to obtain a PLA/r-GO polymer composite. This composite is further mixed with PS via batch melt compounding. We observe the migration of r-GO from the PLA phase to the interface during annealing. The interfacial r-GO suppresses the coarsening of cocontinuous morphology and increases the conductivity of the filled polymer blend. Moreover, we systematically investigate the relationship between r-GO localization, rheological and conductivity change during annealing of r-GO filled PLA/PS blends.