• Korean Membrane Journal
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.8-14
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• 2009

The sulfonated poly(styrene-divinylbenzene-acrylonitrile) (ST-DVB-AN) composite polymer electrolyte membrane based on the original PVC film was successfully synthesized to improve oxidative stability using semi-interpenetrated polymer network (semi-IPN). Weight gain ratio after copolymerization was enhanced by the DVB and AN contents, and the sulfonated membranes were characterized in terms of proton conductivity (k), ion exchange capacity (IEC), and water uptake ($W_U$). The effect of DVB content and AN addition were thoroughly investigated by comparing the resulted properties including oxidative stability. The obtained ST-DVB-AN composited semi-IPN membranes showed relatively high proton conductivity and IEC compared with Nafion117, and greatly improved oxidative stability of the synthesized membrane was obtained. This study demonstrated that a semi-interpenetrated sulfonated ST-DVB-AN composited membrane reinforced by PVC polymer network is a promising candidate as an inexpensive polymer electrolyte membrane for fuel cell applications.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.44-48
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• 2014

Sulfonated poly(arylene ether sulfone)-cerium composite membranes with improved oxidative stability were prepared for proton exchange membrane fuel cell application. Oxidative stability of the composite membranes changed depending on the amount of incorporated metal. Their water uptake, IEC and proton conductivity were also affected. ICP analysis confirmed trace of cerium ion in the composite membranes and $^1H$-NMR indicated successful coordination of sulfonic acid groups with the metal ions. Increasing amount of the cerium ion resulted in decrease in proton conductivities and water uptake, but enhanced oxidative stabilities. A hydrogen peroxide exposure equipment was used for the test of oxidative stability of the composite membranes, which enabled to mimic fuel cell operating condition compared with conventional Fenton's test.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.75-80
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• 2015

Multi-block sulfonated poly(arylene ether sulfone) (SPAES) copolymer was synthesized via nucleophilic aromatic substitution reaction for proton exchange membrane fuel cell application. After synthesizing the hydrophilic and hydrophobic precursor oligomers having different end-groups (F-terminated or OH-terminated), the effect of end group on the molecular weight was investigated. Hydrophilic oligomers with hydroquinone showed better performance as fuel cell membranes. SPAES membranes showed comparable proton conductivity to that of Nafion at $80^{\circ}C$ and above 70% RH. In particular, SPAES 9 with hydroquinone showed higher proton conductivity than SPAES 10 in the whole RH range studied. Increased local concentration of sulfonic acids within hydrophilic block might develop the hydrophilic-hydrophobic phase separation in the block copolymers.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.149-157
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• 2006

Hydrogen as new energy sources is highly efficient and have very low environmental emissions. The proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) is an emerging technology that can meet these demands. Therefore, the preparation of stable polymeric membranes with good proton conductivity and durability are very important for hydrogen production via water electrolysis with PEM at medium temperature above $80^{\circ}C$. Currently Nafion of Dupont and Aciflex of Asahi, etc., solid polymer electrolytes of perfluorosulfonic acid membrane, are the best performing commercially available polymer electrolytes. However, these membrane have several flaws including its high cost, and its limited operational temperature above $80^{\circ}C$. Because of this, significant research efforts have been devoted to the development of newer and cheaper membranes. In order to make up for the weak points and to improve the mechanical characteristics with cross -linking, acid-base complexes were prepared by the combination PSf-co-PPSS-$NH_2$ with PEEK-$SO_3H$. The results showed that the proton conductivity decreased in 17.6% and 40% but tensile strength increased in 78% and 98%, about $20.65\;{\times}\;10^6N/m^2$, in comparison with SBPSf/HPA and SPEEK/HPA complex membrane.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.164-175
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• 2022

In this work, sulfonated poly (ether ether ketone) (SPEEK) composite membranes including strontium zirconate (SrZrO₃) were fabricated by the electrospinning method. Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopic analysis and X-ray diffraction analysis were used to identify the chemical structure and the crystallinity of SrZrO₃ and electrospun composite membranes. The thermal stability of the pure SPEEK and SPEEK/SrZrO₃ electrospun composite membranes were investigated by using thermogravimetric analysis. The physicochemical properties and proton conductivity were enhanced with the addition of different weight ratio of SrZrO₃ nanofiller (2, 4 and 6 wt%) in SPEEK polymer. The optimized SPEEK/SrZrO₃-4 electrospun membrane containing 4 wt% of SrZrO₃ showed a high proton conductivity compared to other electrospun SPEEK/SrZrO₃ composite membranes. The results indicate that electrospun composite membranes incorporating these perovskite nanofillers should be explored as potential candidates for use in proton exchange membrane fuel cells.

• Polymer(Korea)
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.525-530
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• 2012

In this study, silane-crosslinked organic/inorganic composite membranes were prepared by simultaneous irradiation grafting of binary monomer mixtures (styrene and 3-(trimethoxysilyl)propyl methacrylate (TMSPM)) with various compositions onto a poly(ethylene-alt-tetraethylene) (ETFE) film and followed by sol-gel processing and sulfonation to provide a silane-crosslinked structure and a proton conducting ability, respectively. The Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and thermo gravimetric analysis (TGA) were utilized to confirm the crosslinking of ETFE-g-PS/PTMSPM films. The prepared membranes with similar ion exchange capacity but a different TMSPM content were selected and their membrane properties were compared. The ETFE-g-PSSA/PTMSPM membranes were characterized by water uptake, dimensional stability, and proton conductivity after sulfonation. The membrane electrode assemblies (MEA) of the prepared membranes were fabricated and their single cell performances were measured.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.57 no.4
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• pp.512-518
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• 2019

To develop a membrane electrode assembly (MEA) with lower Pt loading and higher performance in proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs), it is an important research issue to understand interfacial structure of Pt/C catalyst and ionomer and design the catalyst layer structure. In this study, we prepared short-side-chain Nafion-based ionomer dispersion using propylene glycol (PG) as a solvent instead of water which is commonly used as a solvent for commercially available ionomers. Cathode catalyst layers with different ionomer content from 20 to 35 wt% were prepared using the ionomer dispersion for the fabrication of four different MEAs, and their fuel cell performance was evaluated. As the ionomer content increased to 35 wt%, the performance of the prepared MEAs increased proportionally, unlike the commercially available water-based ionomer, which exhibited an optimum at about 25 wt%. Small size micelles and slow evaporation of PG in the ionomer dispersion were effective in proton transfer by inducing the formation of a uniformly structured catalyst layer, but the low oxygen permeability problem of the PG-based ionomer film should be resolved to improve the MEA performance.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.234-240
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• 2008

This work demonstrates the preparation of proton conducting crosslinked polymer electrolyte membranes by blending polystrene-b-poly(hydroxyethyl acrylate) (PS-b-PHEA) and poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) at 1 : 1 wt ratio. The PHEA block of the diblock copolymer was crosslinked with PVA using sulfosuccinic acid (SA) via the esterification reaction between -OH of membrane and -COOH of SA, as confirmed by FT-IR spectroscopy. Ion exchange capacity (IEC) continuously increased from 0.14 to 0.91 meq/g with increasing concentrations of SA, due to the increasing portion of charged groups in the membrane. In contrast, the water uptake increased up to 20.0 wt% of SA concentration above which it decreased monotonically. The membrane also exhibited a maximum proton conductivity of 0.024 S/cm at 20.0 wt% of SA concentration. The maximum behavior of water uptake and proton conductivity is considered to be due to competitive effect between the increase of ionic sites and the crosslinking reaction according to the SA concentration.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.173-182
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• 2019

Much research has been made for finding new and eco-friendly alternative sources of energy to solve the problems related with the pollution caused by emissions of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide as the use of fossil fuels increases worldwide. Among them, fuel cells draws particular interests as an eco-friendly energy generator because only water is obtained as a by-product. Anion exchange membrane-based alkaline fuel cell (AEMFC) that uses anion exchange membrane as an electrolyte is of increased interest recently because of its advantages in using low-cost metal catalyst unlike the PEMFC (potton exchange membrane fuel cell) due to the high-catalyst activity in alkaline conditions. The main properties required as an anion exchange membrane are high hydroxide conductivity and chemical stability at high pH. Recently we reported a chemically crosslinked poly(2-dimethyl-1,4-phenylene oxide) (PPO) by reacting PPO with N,N,N',N'-tetramethyl-1,6-hexanediamine as novel anion exchange membranes. In the current work, we further developed the same crosslinked polymer but having enhanced physicochemical properties, including higher conductivity, increased mechanical and dimensional stabilities by using the PPO with a higher molecular weight and also by increasing the crosslinking density. The obtained polymer membrane also showed a good cell performance.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.217-221
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• 2010

In order to overcome the drawback of proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs), solid alkalime membrane fuel cells (SAMFCs) have been studied. In this report, we synthesized new sulfonated polybenzimidazole derivatives for SAMFCs. The polyimidazole derivatives were doped by KOH, and base-doped polybenzimidazoles showed high hydroxy ion conductivity and excellent mechanical properties. Especially, sPBI-co-PBI (75 : 25 for molar ratio of sulfonated and non-sulfonated moiety) showed good possibility for the anion exchange membrane. It has $2.98{\times}10^{-2}\;S/cm$ at $90^{\circ}C$ under 100% relative humidity.