Probing the Morphology of Hydrocarbon-Based Anion-Exchange Membranes via Scattering and Computational Methods

While perfluorinated polymers dominate the commercial fuel cell industry, hostility to catalysts, difficult and expensive synthetic routes, and challenging disposal hamper wide adoption of fuel cell technology and impede further development. Hydrocarbon-based membranes utilize simple, well-developed synthetic routes that allow for rapid material development. We have investigated a promising series of methylated (benz)imidazole-based ionenes utilizing a combination of lab-scale X-ray scattering and molecular dynamics simulations, based on the united-atom DREIDING model with targeted optimizations to quickly elucidate the morphology of these materials. Derived structure-property relationships may motivate further material development.