Modification of GO based on click reaction and its composite fibers with poly(vinyl alcohol)

We present a novel approach to the functionalization of graphene oxide (GO) based on click reaction, in which GO was modified by 3-mercaptopropionic acid (MPA) via thiol-ene reaction in mild reacting conditions. The modified GO (mGO) was bonded with poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) to get PVA grafted mGO (p-mGO) and the composite fibers of PVA and p-mGO were prepared using a wet-spinning process. Compared with PVA grafted GO (p-GO) without the process of click reaction, where PVA chains only distribute at the edge of GO, much more PVA chains are bonded on the surface of mGO. Therefore, p-mGO has better dispersibility in PVA than p-GO because of better interaction between p-mGO and PVA, resulting in much higher mechanical properties of PVA/p-mGO than PVA/p-GO. For example, the strength of PVA/p-mGO fiber is up to 908.93 MPa, 57% higher than that of PVA/p-GO fiber at the same GO loading of 0.4 wt%. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.