Thermal conductivity of nanoresins as a function of particle concentration determined by thermal lens and thermal interferometry techniques

Nanoresins from silver nanoparticles’ colloids are used for 3D printing of parts by stereolithography. This process is based on nonradioactive relaxation after interaction with an electromagnetic field of ultraviolet light. For such an application, it is important to know the thermal conductivity. This work presents a new experimental arrangement to measure the thermal conductivity of nanoresins as a function of the concentration of the metal particle using the thermal lens (TL) technique and a modified arrangement of Michelson interferometer. The result showed a nonlinear growth of the nanoresin thermal conductivity as a function of the Ag nanoparticles (AgNPs) concentration. The AgNPs were synthetized by a green method. Their size was determined by TEM (transmission electron microscopy), and the optical characterization was done by UV–Vis spectroscopy. Classic Hamilton–Crosser (H–C), Maxwell and artificial neural network (ANN) models were proposed and used to predict the thermal conductivity of the composite resin. TL and interferometry techniques represent a good alternative for the determination of heat transport in liquid media, curing systems and 3D printed parts for applications in many fields such as materials science, medicine, transport phenomena and industry.