Novel composite polymer electrolyte comprising poly(ethylene oxide) and triblock copolymer/mesostructured silica hybrid used for lithium polymer battery

Ordered mesoporous materials, due to its potential applications in catalysis, separation technologies, and nano-science have attracted much attention in the past few years. In this work, a novel PEO-based composite polymer electrolyte by using organic–inorganic hybrid EO20PO70EO20 @ mesoporous silica (P123 @ SBA-15) as the filler has been developed. The interactions between P123 @ SBA-15 hybrid and PEO chains are studied by X-ray diffraction (XRD), differential scanning calorimeter (DSC), and FT-IR techniques. The effects of P123 @ SBA-15 on the electrochemical properties of the PEO-based electrolyte, such as ionic conductivity, lithium ion transference number are studied by electrochemical ac impedance spectroscopy and steady-state current method. The experiment results show that P123 @ SBA-15 can enhance the ionic conductivity and increase the lithium ion transference number of PEO-based electrolyte, which are induced by the special topology structure of P123 in P123 @ SBA-15 hybrid, at the same time. The excellent lithium transport properties and broad electrochemical stability window suggesting that PEO–LiClO4/P123 @ SBA-15 composite polymer electrolyte can be used as candidate electrolyte materials for lithium polymer batteries.