Grafting silica onto reduced graphene oxide via hydrosilylation for comprehensive rubber applications: Molecular simulation and experimental study

Abstract The development of multifunctional rubber composites and the dispersion of fillers are always a focus in the industrial field of tires. In this work, supported by predictions from molecular simulations, reduced graphene oxide grafted with silica (rGO‐g‐SiO₂) is fabricated through hydrosilylation. Structural and morphological characterization shows that SiO₂ is present at the rGO surface. rGO‐g‐SiO₂ was subsequently applied to enhance the performance of solution polymerized styrene butadiene rubber (SSBR) composites. As predicted from simulations, the mechanical and thermal properties of rGO‐g‐SiO₂/SSBR are found to be improved due to an enhanced interfacial interaction and higher degree of phonon matching. In particular, with a 1.5% weight percentage of rGO, the reinforcing index and thermal conductivity of 1.5%‐rGO‐g‐SiO₂/SSBR are found to be 168.7% and 114.0% higher than that for 1.5%‐rGO/SiO₂/SSBR (physical mixture), respectively. The reinforced integrated performance is promising for the potential application of rGO‐g‐SiO₂ as a filler for rubber composites.