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Temperature-dependent electrical resistance of conductive polylactic acid filament for fused deposition modeling

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Abstract

This study characterizes the microstructure and temperature dependence of resistance of two commercially available electrically conductive polylactic acid (PLA) composites for fused deposition modeling (FDM): PLA-carbon black and PLA-graphene. No microstructural changes were observed between the filament and the printed parts; however, the resistivity of the filament was found to drop by four to six times upon FDM. Also, compared to the resistivity of individual extruded wire, the resistivity of the printed parts was found to be up to 1500 times higher for PLA-graphene and up to 300 times higher for PLA-carbon black. The raw PLA-carbon black filament and printed wire showed a positive temperature coefficient of resistance (α) value between ~ 0.03 and 0.01 °C−1, which makes them more suitable for sensor development. The raw PLA-graphene filament and printed wire did not exhibit a significant α, which makes them more suitable for printing wires. However, the parts made with multilayer FDM exhibited a negative or a negligible α up to a certain temperature prior to exhibiting a positive α; further, these α values were significantly lower than those obtained for the filaments before or after extrusion. These findings enable proper selection of commercial conductive FDM filaments for enabling quicker prototyping of electronics and sensors.

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Acknowledgements

We are thankful to the staff members at the Institute for Micromanufacturing and the Center for Biomedical Engineering and Rehabilitation Sciences. We thank Chinedu Okafor, Nowzesh Hasan, and Zachary Swart for their timely inputs and feedback concerning designing the experiment and in interpreting the data.

Funding

The research reported in this publication was supported by (1) the National Science Foundation through the cooperative agreement OIA-1541079 and the Louisiana Board of Regents, (2) an Institutional Development Award (IDeA) from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences of the National Institutes of Health under grant number P20GM103424, and (3) the Research Competitiveness Subprogram from the Louisiana Board of Regents through the Board of Regents Support Fund under the contract number LEQSF (2013-2016)-RD-A-09.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Micromanufacturing, Louisiana Tech University, 911 Hergot Avenue, Ruston, LA, 71272, USA

    Fraser Daniel, Naim Hossain Patoary, Arden L. Moore, Leland Weiss & Adarsh D. Radadia

  2. Mechanical Engineering, Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, LA, 71272, USA

    Arden L. Moore & Leland Weiss

  3. Chemical Engineering, Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, LA, 71272, USA

    Adarsh D. Radadia

  4. Center for Biomedical Engineering and Rehabilitation Sciences, Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, LA, 71272, USA

    Adarsh D. Radadia

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  1. Fraser Daniel
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  2. Naim Hossain Patoary
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Correspondence to Adarsh D. Radadia.

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Daniel, F., Patoary, N.H., Moore, A.L. et al. Temperature-dependent electrical resistance of conductive polylactic acid filament for fused deposition modeling. Int J Adv Manuf Technol 99, 1215–1224 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00170-018-2490-z

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