Graphene‐Based Magnetocaloric Composites for Energy Conversion

Herein, a simple, versatile, and cost-effective method to fabricate innovativethermal conductive magnetocaloric (MC) composites, which offers a smartsolution to manufacture active elements with desired geometries, overcomingthe current thermal and mechanical limits of the most studied MC materials, ispresented. The composite is prepared by embedding powder of a MC material inan epoxy matrix enriched with a graphene-based material, obtained by thermalexfoliation of graphite oxide. The graphene-enriched composite shows asignificant improvement of the MC time response to the magneticfield, due tothe formation of a 3D network that bridges the MC particles and reduces themetal–matrix contact resistance, thus creating a percolation path for an efficientheat transfer. Because of the simplicity and scalability of the preparation methodand the great enhancement in response time, these new functional compositesrepresent an important step for the effective application of MC materials inthermomagnetic devices for the energy conversion.