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Synthesis and characterization of CNTs doped polymeric composites: comparative studies on exploring impact of CNT concentration on morphological, structural, thermokinetic and mechanical attributes

  • Sabiha Sultana EMAIL logo , Noor Saeed , Noor Ul Amin , Abbas Khan , Rozina Khattak , Amir Naveed , Imran Rehan , Kamran Rehan , Mohib Ullah and Mujeeb Ur Rehman
Published/Copyright: August 5, 2025

Abstract

In the present work, an attempt was made to adopt solvent casting approach to synthesize and compare PEO/CNT and PMMA/CNT composites with varying concentration of CNTs while using SDS as a surfactant to enhance dispersion and prevent agglomeration. Different characterization techniques namely Thermal Gravimetric Analysis, Scanning Electron Microscopy, X-ray Diffraction Analysis and Universal Testing Machine were betrothed to characterize and evaluate the effect of CNT loading on PEO/CNT with PMMA/CNT composites. TGA revealed that thermal sturdiness of PEO/CNT’s lifts sharply by CNT’s whereas PMMA/CNT’s thermal stability increases gradually. SEM images exposed that functionalized multiwall CNT in PEO accelerates the crystal growth by showing fungus like morphology as witnessed in low magnification images. The low magnification SEM images for PMMA/CNT shows bubble like morphology. The sharp peaks and semi crystalline nature of PEO/CNT and Humps and increase in crystallinity with CNT for PMMA/CNT composites were confirmed by XRD. UTM investigation confirmed that plasticity amplifies with increasing CNT loading in fabricated hybrid. Similarly UTM investigation explored that incorporation of CNT in both polymers augments mechanical performance. Evaluation of decomposition thermal energy confirmed that CNT loading boosts up thermal activation energy more for PMMA in contrary to PEO. Based on our findings it is safe to conclude that physical attributes of polymeric system is highly sensitive to the CNT loadings and must be incorporated with care as linear increasing CNT effects various parameters (Crystallinity, thermal strength and mechanical performance) unsymmetrically.


Corresponding author: Sabiha Sultana, Department of Chemistry, Islamia College University Peshawar, Peshawar, Pakistan; and Environmental and Sustainability Institute, Penryn Campus, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK, E-mail:

Acknowledgement

The authors are very thankful to the financial assistance provided by the Project Management Unit (PMU) of Higher Education Department, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa under Project No. HEREF-118.

  1. Research ethics: This research did not involve any studies on human participants or animals requiring ethical approval. All experimental protocols complied with institutional and national guidelines.

  2. Informed consent: Not applicable. No human data or images were used in this study.

  3. Author contributions: Sabiha Sultana: Conceptualization, supervision, Funding acquisition, methodology, writing original draft, Noor Saeed: Project guidance, validation, data curation. Noor Ul Amin: project administration, investigation. Abbas Khan: writing original draft, Resources, Rozina Khattak: Writing review and editing. Amir Naveed: Investigation, validation. Imran Rehan: Formal analysis, data curation. Kamran Rehan: Data analysis, writing review and editing. Mohib Ullah: methodology, Resources. Mujeeb Ur Rehman: technical support, final approval. All authors have read and approved the final version of the manuscript.

  4. Use of Large Language Models, AI and Machine Learning Tools: No generative AI or machine learning tools were used in the preparation of this manuscript.

  5. Conflict of interest: The authors declare that there are no competing interests.

  6. Research funding: This work was supported by the Project Management Unit (PMU) of Higher Education Department, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa under Project No. HEREF-118.

  7. Data availability: All data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article. Additional data are available from the corresponding author upon request.

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Received: 2023-03-12
Accepted: 2025-07-15
Published Online: 2025-08-05
Published in Print: 2025-10-27

© 2025 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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