Role of thickness and density on the ionic conductivity of fuel cell membrane prepared with supramolecular structure

Membrane in Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC) plays important role in electrochemical reaction within, which allow ion to pass, but prevent electron to pass through. Thus, membrane plays critical role in facilitating electrochemical reaction. Effort have been made to make membrane other than Nafion®. The new mentioned membrane is prepared by constructing supramolecular structure arise from hydrogen bond between sulfonated polystyrene (sPS) and polyethylene-graft-maleic anhydride (PE-g-MAH). Therefore, the understanding of new membrane’s ability to conduct ion will be investigated with respect to its thickness. The immediate results show that thinner membrane gets better in the expected properties. This fact could be observed from the value of ionic conductivity which reaches a value of 10−5 S.cm−1. The initial results indicate thickness of the membrane affect water uptake into membrane, and the dense of membrane could also alter the ionic conductivity properties.