Bottlebrush Polymeric Ionic Liquids

Polymeric ionic liquids (PILs) have attracted significant interest due to their potential to combine the high ionic conductivity of ionic liquids with the mechanical properties of polymers. However, PILs typically exhibit lower ionic conductivity at a given temperature than their ionic liquid counterparts. While studies of salt-doped polymer electrolytes have shown that polymer architecture can impact ionic conductivity by changing crystallinity, such architectural effects have not been systematically explored in PILs. Herein, we compare the ionic conductivities of bottlebrush and linear PILs. These two architectures have almost identical glass transition temperatures, but the ionic conductivity of the bottlebrush is approximately double that of the linear architecture throughout a wide temperature range. The origin of such an architectural effect will be discussed in this presentation.