High permittivity polyaniline–barium titanate nanocomposites with excellent electromagnetic interference shielding response

Abstract

Organic conductive polymers are at the forefront of materials science research because of their diverse applications built around their interesting and unique properties. This work reports for the first time a correlation between the structural, electrical, and electromagnetic properties of polyaniline (PANI)–tetragonal BaTiO₃ (TBT) nanocomposites prepared by in-situ emulsion polymerization. XRD studies and HRTEM micrographs of these nanocomposites clearly revealed the incorporation of TBT nanoparticles in the conducting PANI matrix. EPR and XPS measurements reveal that increase in loading level of BaTiO₃ results in a reduction of the doping level of PANI. The Ku-Band (12.4–18 GHz) network analysis of these composites shows exceptional microwave shielding response with absorption dominated total shielding effectiveness (SE_T) value of −71.5 dB (blockage of more than 99.99999% of incident radiation) which is the highest value reported in the literature. Such a high attenuation level, which critically depends on the fraction of BaTiO₃ is attributed to optimized dielectric and electrical attributes. This demonstrates the possibility of using these materials in stealth technology and for making futuristic radar absorbing materials (RAMs).