The
application of polymers as an essential class of material was
greatly inhibited due to the aging failure of these versatile materials
during normal use. Hence, it is generally recognized that stabilization
against thermo-oxidative aging is indispensable to extend the service
life of polymers for long-term applications. However, toxicity and
pollution of the state-of-the-art antiaging technologies have long
been puzzles in the polymer industry. Herein, sustainable carbon nanodots
(CDs), synthesized by facile and cost-effective microwave-assisted
pyrolysis, are used for first time as radical scavengers to resist
the thermo-oxidative aging of elastomers. We have demonstrated that
incorporation of the resultant CDs could be green and generic radical
scavengers toward highly aging-resistant elastomers. Furthermore,
by controlling the photoluminescent quantum yield of the CDs with
various passivated agents, tunable radical scavenging activity was
achieved. We established for the first time that the aging resistance
originates from the prominent reactive radical scavenging activity
of the CDs, which was rationally controlled by their photoluminescent
quantum yield
