Nacre-inspired flexible MXene/konjac glucomannan film with mechanical robustness for electromagnetic interference shielding

The rapid development of portable electronic devices requires high-performance electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding materials that exhibit excellent mechanical strength and flexibility. Inspired by the hierarchical structure and mechanical robustness of nacre, in this work, we choose konjac glucomannan (KGM) as the mortar and MXene as the brick to prepare an ultrathin, flexible and environmentally friendly MXene/KGM composite film via a facile vacuum-assisted filtration method. MXene nanosheets are introduced into KGM matrix to assemble a nacre-like structure through strong hydrogen bonding interactions between the rich surface-terminating groups of MXene and the hydroxyl groups of KGM. As expected, the as-prepared MXene/KGM composite film with 40 wt% MXene content exhibits optimal mechanical properties, including a tensile strength of 145.8 MPa and an elongation at break of 8.1 %. Moreover, this composite film also achieves an EMI shielding effectiveness of 24 dB, demonstrating a balance between mechanical properties and EMI shielding effectiveness. The resulting environmentally friendly MXene/KGM composite film demonstrates significant potential for application in next-generation flexible electronic devices.