Tuning ion conducting pathways using holographic polymerization.

Smith, Derrick M; Dong, Bin; Marron, Russell W; Birnkrant, Michael J; Elabd, Yossef A; Natarajan, Lalgudi V; Tondiglia, Vincent P; Bunning, Timothy J et al. · Nano Lett · 2012

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Polymer electrolyte membranes (PEMs) with high and controlled ionic conductivity are important for energy-related applications, such as solid-state batteries and fuel cells. Herein we disclose a new strategy to fabricate long-range ordered PEMs with tunable ion conducting pathways using a holographic polymerization (HP) method. By incorporating polymer electrolyte into the carefully selected HP system, electrolyte layers/channels with length scales of a few tens of nanometers to micrometers can be formed with controlled orientation and anisotropy; ionic conductivity anisotropy as high as 37 has been achieved.

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