Fabrication and EMI (electromagnetic interference) shielding performance of polyester fabrics coated with polyaniline via in-situ polymerization

Polyaniline (PANI) coated polyester fabrics were synthesized via in-situ polymerization approach. It was demonstrated that the two electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding results which measured by vector network analyzer (VNA) and calculated by dielectric parameters have almost the same values. The experimental results indicate that PANI is semi-crystalline in nature so it exhibits 2 broad peaks in XRD pattern. DC conductivity which measured by four-probe technique increased from insulative region to maximum value of 8.2 S/cm. Less 0.1% transmission was observed in UV, visible and near infrared (NIR) region. The EMI shielding was tested in the frequency range of 1–13 GHz, and it increased from 3 dB to 38 dB for pure fabric and PANI coated fabric respectively. The thermal imaging signal analysis shows the complete blockage of IR radiation could make human body almost invisible to thermal imagining camera.