Highly efficient and responsive thin heaters based on CVD graphene/polyetherimide nanolaminates for next-gen thermal management applications

Graphene, with its superior physical properties, has been considered as the perfect candidate for the production of lightweight, high-strength composite materials with interesting multi-functionalities. The use of large-sized, high-quality CVD graphene monolayers alternated to ultra-thin polymer films in a laminate configuration has been recently proposed as an efficient route to overcome many of the limitations faced by the use of discontinuous sheets of graphene in nanocomposites. Here we report on the production of CVD graphene/polyetherimide (Gr/PEI) nanolaminates with very low graphene volume fractions (up to 0.165 vol%), using a modified iterative and automatic lift-off/float-on procedure. The produced freestanding Gr/PEI nanolaminates present not only a significant enhancement of mechanical and electrical properties but, very interestingly, show impressive Joule heating efficiency. In fact, upon the application of an electrical potential, they can reach temperatures higher than 250 °C, with heating rates up to 325 °C/s. The produced heaters show a very uniform distribution of the temperature even when bend and are characterized by low power consumptions (up to 16 Watt) and high areal power densities (up to ca. ∼1.28 W/cm2), thus suggesting their possible application in thermal management.