Porous polyamide 6/carbon black composite as an effective electromagnetic interference shield

Porous conductive polymer composites (CPCs) with functional additives are potential lightweight electromagnetic interference (EMI) materials. In this study, porous polyamide 6/carbon black (PA6/CB) composite was fabricated by a facile solution foaming strategy. When the content of CB was up to 20 wt%, a conductive network of CB was formed. The EMI shielding effectiveness (SE) of the prepared composites increased with CB fraction in porous CPCs. When the content of CB reached 50 wt%, the values of SE reached 33.7-37.3 dB in the X band. This composite showed an EMI specific SE of 221.97 dB cm(3) g(-1). The average absorptivity coefficient of EMI reached 82.4% when the CB fraction was increased to 30 wt%. CPCs having a high fraction of inorganic CB showed an advantage in the reduction of non-biodegradable plastics usage. The porous PA6/CB composite is a promising EMI material with an absorption-dominated mechanism in the engineering field. (c) 2021 Society of Industrial Chemistry.