Development and Characterization of Functionalized Titanium Dioxide-Reinforced Sulfonated Copolyimide (SPI/TiO2) Nanocomposite Membranes with Improved Mechanical, Thermal, and Electrochemical Properties

Synthesis of clay‐armored coatable sulfonated polyimide nanocomposites as robust polyelectrolyte membranes

“…1 Due to the H-bond among the imidazole functional group of benzimidazole in the SPIBI, or incomplete H-exchange in the experiment, the ion exchange capacity value of the film was experimentally lower than the theoretical value, which prevents the proton exchange. 27 The value of IEC increase with an increase in the clay contents and the value of IEC is in the range of 3.12-3.16 mol/g, respectively. These values may not be much lower or too much higher than the values of the report.…”

“…1 The F I G U R E 7 Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images of the neat and clay reinforced sulfonated polyimide (SPIs) nanocomposites H-transformation of PEM can be directly disturbed by water uptake. 27 The H 2 O uptake property of clay reinforced SPIs films were carried out by a measured change in the weight of hydrated and dehydrated film after immersing it into deionized H 2 O overnight under ambient condition. Due to the phase separation, aggregation, and interaction in clay nanofillers during composite structure shrinkage, the H 2 O uptake marginally declines with enhanced clay contents.…”

“…), incorporation of clay materials and heteropoly acids have been used as a filler to improve SO 3 H membrane such as SPIs. 27 The incorporation of modified nanofillers material such as aminosilane can satisfactorily improve the hybrid sulfonated polyimide structure by creating contact between the amino group and sulfonic acid of modified clay composites. The hydrolytic stability of clay reinforced-SPIs is 98 h, which was remarkably enhanced due to the SO 3 H group and a high degree of polymerization of benzimidazole resulting in the close-packed structure of the composite chain and hydrolytic stability values shown in Table 4.…”

“…The SPI-TiO 2 nanocomposite shows excellent hydrolytic, oxidative, chemical, and thermal stabilities. 27 Montmorillonite (MMT)-Nafion by applying direct addition of Nafion into MMT modified by dodecyl amine and use of MMT decrease methanol cross over without effecting proton conductivity. 28 Organic impurities like phenol, aniline, nitrophenol, and so forth.…”

Sulfonated Polysulfone/TiO2(B) Nanowires Composite Membranes as Polymer Electrolytes in Fuel Cells

“…Furthermore reduce the fuel-oxygen cross-over and improve mechanical properties. In this regard, the most studied inorganic fillers for polymer proton exchange membranes are SiO 2 [ 16 , 17 , 18 ], zeolites [ 19 ], zirconium hydrogen phosphate (ZrP) [ 20 ], and TiO 2 [ 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 ]. Among all these options, TiO 2 is a good choice as an inorganic filler because it leads to a good chemical stability and good hydration to the polymer due to its high capability of absorbing water [ 26 ].…”