Highly Porous Regenerated Cellulose Fiber Mats via the Co-Forcespinning of Cellulose Acetate for Separator Applications

Improvements in battery technology are necessary for the transition away from a fossil fuel based economy. An important bottle-neck in battery efficiency is the quality of the separator, which separates the cathode and anode to prevent a short-circuit while still allowing the ions in solution to flow as close to unabated as possible. In this work solutions of cellulose acetate, polyvinyldiflourine (pvdf), and polyvinylpyrrolidone (pvp) dissolved in a 2:1 v/v acetone/dimethylacetamide ~~solvent mixture were Forcespun to create nonwoven fiber mats of nanoscale diameter. These mats were then soaked in a NaOH solution so as to both strip the pvp from the fiber as well as regenerate cellulose from its acetate derivative for the purpose of creating ~high surface area, nanoporous, hydrophilic, and ioniclly conductive cellulose/pvdf nonwoven mats for the purposes of testing their suitability as battery separators