Synthesis mechanism of different morphological SiC and its electromagnetic absorption performance

This article presents a facile synthesis of different morphological silicon carbides (SiC) absorbers by adjusting the weight ratio of carbon spheres to waste glass powder. With the decreased proportion of waste glass powder, the diffusion rate of SiO vapour decreases, which is lower than the deposition rate, leading to the morphology change from fluffy spheres to nanofibers. The electromagnetic wave (EMW) absorbing results show that the fluffy spherical SiC possesses the optimal EMW absorption performance with an effective absorption bandwidth 4.81 GHz at 1.6 mm, mainly due to stacking faults-induced polarisation loss and conductive loss. By comparison, the EMW absorbing ability of SiC obtained through wasted glass powder is better than the normal SiC prepared through commercial SiO2. Thus, the waste glass has shown great promise as silicon resources to prepare high-performance SiC absorbers.