PSI - Issue 80

Stanislav Buklovskyi et al. / Procedia Structural Integrity 80 (2026) 146–156 Author name / Structural Integrity Procedia 00 (2019) 000 – 000

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wear, corrosion and low coefficient of friction which makes it a material of choice for different industrial (Chen et al., 2024) and biomedical applications (Kurtz, 2015). Despite its excellent mechanical properties, many applications of UHMWPE would benefit from the increase of its conductive (both thermal and electrical) properties (Liu et al., 2018; X. Sun et al., 2024). UHMWPE-based composites are often considered by researchers for this purpose. Conductivity of polymers is often improved by conductive reinforcement. For example, carbon nanotubes (CNTs) were considered by Biercuk et al. (2002) as an additive to increase thermal conductivity of epoxy utilizing the resultant composite in electronic thermal management applications. Bagchi & Nomura (2005) studied thermal conductivity modeling of CNT-reinforced composites. A detailed review of the thermal conductivity of CNTs and their polymer composites was conducted by Han & Fina (2011). Nanographene (NG) is another kind of additive considered for thermally conductive polymer composites. Thermal properties of NG, its properties and applications of its composites in electronic, optoelectronic and photonic systems are discussed in Li et al. (2017). Another study by Colonna et al. (2016) investigated the morphology of NG-based polymer nanocomposites. Thermal, mechanical and electrical properties were investigated by means of dynamic mechanical thermal analysis, volumetric resistivity and thermal conductivity measurements. A detailed review of NG/polymer composites and their applications is provided in Pinto & Magalhães (2021). Carbon Black (CB), as a highly conductive material, is often considered as an additive for electrically conductive polymer composites (Spahr et al., 2017). Thermal conductivity of CB is considered to be less substantial than of CNT or NG but with potential to improve the overall thermal properties of polymer-based composites (Miler & Lienhard, 2006; Ram et al., 2020). Several studies considered thermal conductivity of UHMWPE-based composites. For example, Eun et al. (2022) analyzed CNT/UHMWPE microstructure utilizing scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and evaluated thermal conductivity via thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). NG/UHMWPE was investigated in Alam et al. (2019). Morphological characterization was performed by SEM and thermal properties were evaluated by TGA. To predict the effective thermal conductivity of the thermally conductive polymer-based composites, both analytical and numerical approaches have been employed by researchers. Analytical methods for nanosized and microsized conductive inclusions were utilized by Tsekmes et al. (2014) to investigate the role of different fillers in the thermal conductivity of polymeric composites. Shape, size and thermal conductivity of conductive additives were considered, and the role of particle agglomeration was discussed. Another study by Zha et al. (2024) considered the interface between the filler and the matrix and its importance in the mechanism of heat conduction of the overall composite. Numerical modeling of thermal conductivity of a polymer-based composite was performed in Zhang et al. (2016). Finite element analysis of representative volume elements (RVEs) was utilized to predict thermal properties of graphene filled polymer nanocomposite. The effects of contact thermal conductance and interfacial thermal conductance were investigated, and the results of numerical simulations were compared with the experimental measurements. Another numerical study by Y. Sun et al. (2023) considered numerical modeling of polymeric composites with spherical conductive inclusions. Numerical FEA simulations on RVEs were performed and the results were compared with reported thermal conductivity data on silicone rubber/aluminum oxide composite. An overall review of thermal conductivity modeling of polymeric nanocomposite, performed before 2012, can be found in Jafari Nejad (2012). The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. Section 2 describes the manufacturing and characterization of considered CB/UHMWPE nanoparticles. Section 3 presents analytical and numerical modeling approaches utilized in this study. Section 4 provides the numerical results and their comparison with experimental data. The conclusions are listed in Section 5.