Design of the molecular motions and ion transport behaviour of polymer-based glasses

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Disordered solids such as glasses are important for a wide range of technologies and applications. One important application where disordered solids could play a game-changing role, is as ion-conducting separators, polymer electrolytes, in Li-ion batteries. Lithium ion batteries are the power source of choice for portable electrical devices (laptops and mobile phones) owing to their superior performance in terms of high specific capacity and reliability. The use of Li-ion batteries is predicted to grow substantially in the short to medium term into new areas such as automotive propulsion and energy storage systems with global revenues expected to rise to £40 billion in 2020. Despite this rising demand, we presently lack safe, easy to process and thus low-cost, ideally mechanically flexible batteries. To achieve these targets it is important to be able to design the molecular motions and behaviour of polymer-based glasses. In this project you will perform detailed analysis of data from Broadband Dielectric Relaxation Spectroscopy on glass-forming materials made from mixtures of polymers and small molecules. The aim is to understand in detail what molecular motions take place in these materials and how the mixture composition affects the dynamics. Moreover, you will investigate how ions are transported through these materials and relate this to the molecular motions. The analysis will involve using both dedicated software as well as writing of code in e.g. Matlab or Python. Your results will be put into the context of the wider literature with the aim of better understanding how molecular motions and ion transport can be controlled in glasses.

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