(766g) Thermal Bridges for Phonon Transport through Short Polymer Chains in a Hydrogen Bonded Polymer Composite

Most work to develop thermally conductive polymer composite are based on traditional fillers (metallic/ceramic/carbonic) and matric system which requires high loading of fillers and in turn suffers with various cost and fabrication issues. In this work, thermal highways for heat conduction were introduced by engineering intermolecular interactions within the polymer chain, which in turn drives thermal conduction in polymers films without using any traditional fillers. Thermal conduction pathways were developed in a blend film of long chain Poly(vinyl alcohol) and short chain Poly(ethylene glycol) which lead to thermal conductivity enhancement of around 1.6 times the neat polymer. The critical factor responsible for thermal conduction in these films was found to be homogeneous distribution of “thermal bridges” formed by hydrogen bonding between polymer chains. These thermal bridges leads to the formation of continuous thermal network for the efficient phonon transport in blend films. This work presents a fascinating yet promising non-conventional method to develop thermally conductive polymer based material without using traditional fillers for thermal management applications.