Flexible Films for Smart Thermal Management: Influence of Structure Construction of a Two-Dimensional Graphene Network on Active Heat Dissipation Response Behavior.

In recent years, the development and wide application of micro-electronic technology brings forward high demands for active thermal management systems. However, such systems are not only costly, but also usually tethered, and need constant power to operate. To avoid such a limitation, smart thermal management systems have been developed to achieve active thermal management. Here, inspired by the temperature control principle of a butterfly, a shape memory polymer was used to endow the thermally conductive graphene-polymer hybrid film with intelligence. As the device temperature reaches 60 °C, the bud-shaped hybrid film started to bloom, which is a visually active heat dissipation process. As a result, this active process promoted the thermal management capacity of the hybrid film and increased the temperature-raising time of the light-emitting diode. Through the construction of a bilayer structure, the transmission channel for phonon transfer was optimized, which lead the hybrid film to attain a remarkable thermal conductivity of 21.83 W·m-1·K-1 with 30 wt % graphene. This graphene-polymer hybrid film shows potential application in the smart thermal management field.