| Summary: | A rivet–inspired method of decorating aramid fiber (AF) with silica particles (SiO<sub>2</sub>) is proposed to produce SiO<sub>2</sub>@AF hybrid materials that have largely enhanced interfacial interaction with the rubber matrix. AF was firstly surface-modified with polyacrylic acid (PAA) to obtain PAA–AF, and SiO<sub>2</sub> was silanized with 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane to obtain APES–SiO<sub>2</sub>. Then, SiO<sub>2</sub>@AF was prepared by chemically bonding APES–SiO<sub>2</sub> onto the surface of PAA–AF in the presence of dicyclohexylcarbodiimide (DCC) and 4-dimethylaminopyridine (DMAP). With the incorporation of SiO<sub>2</sub>@AF into the rubber matrix, SiO<sub>2</sub>@AF hybrid materials with high surface roughness can play a role as ‘rivets’ to immobilize large numbers of rubber chains on the surface. The tear strength and tensile strength of rubber composite that filling 4 phr SiO<sub>2</sub>@AF are dramatically increased by 97.8% and 89.3% compared to pure rubber, respectively. Furthermore, SiO<sub>2</sub>@AF has superiority in enhancing the cutting resistance of rubber composites, in contrast with unmodified AF and SiO<sub>2</sub>. SiO<sub>2</sub>@AF is suitable to be applied as a novel reinforcing filler in rubber composites for high performance.
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