Sulfonated polyether ether ketone (SPEEK) is categorized in a nonfluorinated aromatic hydrocarbon proton exchange membrane (PEM) group and considered as a suitable substitute for common per-fluorinated membranes, such as Nafion, due to wider operating temperature, less feed gas crossover, and lower cost. Since modeling results in a better understanding of a phenomenon, in this study a dynamic o...

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are emerging material class for the past few years due to its tailorability characteristics for various applications. However, the research and development (R&D) of MOFs is still scarce for fuel cell system. This may be due to the several difficulties faced in selecting a good MOFs-based electrolyte, which consequently affects both proton conduction and methanol ...

Proton exchange membranes (PEM) for a direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) have main drawbacks which are methanol permeability, reduced proton conductivity and the cost of the membrane. This paper reviews different polymeric materials such as fluorinated, non-fluorinated, acid-base complex, and composite membranes for DMFC. Currently, nonfluorinated membranes gain a lot of atte...

Proton conducting materials having reasonable proton conductivity at low humidification conditions are critical for decrease in system complexity and improvement of power density for polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells. This study shows that polyelectrolyte brushes on titanate nanotubes formed through surface-initiated free radical polymerization exhibit less humidity-dependent proton condu...

In this work, we prepared the nafion/montmorillonite/heteropolyacid nanocomposite membranes for direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs). The analyses such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) were conducted to characterize the filler dispersion and membrane structure in prepared nanocomposite membranes. XRD patterns of nafion-CsPW-MMT ...

Proton transport in the aqueous environment has attracted much attention for more than a century. It is well known that protons are transported by the Grötthuss mechanism (proposed two hundred years ago), which is sometimes referred to by terms such as proton jumping and proton hopping. However, the proton transport mechanisms in constrained systems such as biological membranes, electrolyte mem...

This paper presents an overview of the synthesis, chemical and electrochemical properties, and polymer electrolyte fuel cell applications of new proton-conducting polymer electrolyte membranes based on hydrocarbon polymers. Due to their chemical stability, high degree of proton conductivity, and remarkable mechanical properties, per ̄uorinated polymer electrolytes such as Na®on, Aciplex, Flemion...

heterogeneous proton exchange membranes (pem) are synthesized using the dry phase inversion technique. the casting solutions are prepared by dispersing a finely ground cation exchange resin particle in n,n-dimethylacetamide (dmac) solution of polyvinyl-chloride (pvc). results show that ion exchange capacity is increased with the addition of 1 %-wt nanosilica (from 0.14 to 0.27 meq/g) while it i...

Nowadays, proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) are the most promising green energy conversion devices for portable and stationary applications. Traditionally, these devices were based onperfluoro-sulfonic acid electrolytes membranes, given the commercial name Nafion. Nafion is the mostused electrolyte membrane till now; because of its high electrochemical properties su...

The Cover Feature shows how nitrates, often considered as pollutant and waste species, can be efficiently converted to valuable ammonia in a polymer electrolyte membrane electrolysis cell. By using ruthenium-based catalyst controlling proton transport through the membrane, competing hydrogen evolution reaction was successfully suppressed, enabling high faradaic efficiency for production. More i...