Double percolation and segregated structures formed in polymer alloy with excellent electrical conductivity

Abstract It can efficiently enhance electrical conductivity and electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding performance to construct segregated structures in conductive polymer composites (CPCs). However, it can also deteriorate mechanical properties due to weak interfacial interaction between matrixes and fillers. So segregated structures CPCs that polycarbonate/acrylonitrile‐butadiene‐styrene (PC/ABS) was coated by ABS/multi‐walled carbon nanotubes (ABS/MWCNTs) were prepared by solution‐mechanical mixing method. The surface resistivity of the segregated composites achieved 10⁵ Ω/sq with only 0.05 wt% of MWCNTs and was lower than composites prepared by melt and solution mixing methods. Tensile strength of the segregated composites was nearly 40 MPa. The EMI shielding values of the segregated composites with 7 wt% of MWCNTs were 50 to 80 dB as high as the uniform structure composites with 10 wt% of MWCNTs between 30 MHz and 1 GHz electromagnetic frequency. All the results displayed that this work provided a novel and efficient method to produce segregated conductive composites for antistatic and EMI shielding applications.