Advancement in cellulose-based multifunctional high conductive PNIPAAm/PPy hydrogel/cotton composites for EMI shielding

Exploitation of cotton fabric as electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding substrates have attracted a growing interest due to their desirable low carbon footprint, economic feasibility, and sustainability. Herein, a facile strategy was proposed for preparing a cellulose-based multifunctional PNIPAAm/PPy hydrogel/cotton (PPHC) EMI shielding composites with simultaneous high-efficient electro-photo-thermal conversion and comfort regulation functions. The PPHC was fabricated via in situ polymerization conductive PPy hydrogel on cotton substrate followed by deposition of PNIPAAm. Benefiting from the unique interconnected three-dimensional networked conductive structure of PPy hydrogel, the obtained PPHC composites exhibited high conductivity (15 mS/cm), and EMI shielding effectiveness (EMI SE ~ 40 dB) in the frequency of 8.2–12.3 GHz. Moreover, the PNIPAAm coating endowed the composite fabrics with adjustable wettability performance in response to external temperature, leading to excellent comfort regulation performance. This work provided feasible avenue toward low cost and sustainability cotton-based EMI shielding composites with efficient EMI shielding and comfort regulation performance. Graphical abstract