Study of graphene oxide-based 3D printable composites: Effect of the in situ reduction

This study demonstrates that, PEO-acrylates composite containing graphene oxide (GO) can be easily 3D printed from water based formulations. Exploiting the good water affinity of graphene oxide, the filler can be easily dispersed in oligomers formulations and printed by using a low cost DLP equipment. Then the UV post curing process, which is always mandatory after a DLP process, is exploited to in situ reduce the graphene oxide embedded in the matrix; similarly a thermal treatment is also investigated as post process. Different 3D structures are submitted to the reduction post-treatments and the influence of the UV and thermal reduction on the mechanical and electrical properties of the printed objects is investigated. The present work shows the possibility to easily produce 3D shaped GO-based composites whose final properties can be tailored trough a UV or thermal post process performed on the printed parts that induces the in situ reduction of GO embedded in the polymer matrix.