Preparation of a natural rubber with high thermal conductivity, low heat generation and strong interfacial interaction by using NS-modified graphene oxide

Owing to its remarkable electrical, mechanical and thermal properties, graphene has been considered the most promising reinforcing filler for the development of rubber nanocomposites. In this work, a novel interfacial structure consisting of reduced graphene oxide (rGO)/N-tert-butyl-2-benzothiazole sulfonamide (NS)/natural rubber (NR) (NR/NS-rGO) with covalent bond connections was fabricated using one-step modification and coprecipitation methods. When the filler loading of NS-rGO is 0.42 vol.%, not only the thermal conductivity of the rubber composite increases to 0.237 Wm −1  K −1 , which is 21.5% higher than that of pure NR; meanwhile, the internal heat generation decreases to 2.6 °C, which is 45.8% lower than that of reduced graphene oxide (rGO)/ascorbic acid (VC)/natural rubber (NR) (NR/VC-rGO), and the mechanical properties have been greatly improved. The results demonstrated that the covalent bond connections greatly reduced interfacial thermal resistance at the filler/matrix interface. Furthermore, the enhanced interfacial interaction reduced frictional heat generation at the filler/matrix interface. More importantly, this strategy provided creative insights into the high application potential of graphene in the rubber industry.