A novel intrinsically proton conducting star-shaped imidazole terminated oligomers

Abstract

In this paper, intrinsically proton conducting imidazole-terminated oligomers were synthesized by tethering imidazole units via flexible ethylene oxides (EO) chain onto 1,3,5-benzenetricarbonyl chloride (TMA). The structure of the resulting material was confirmed by FT-IR; 1H-NMR spectrometer and compositions were obtained by elemental analysis. Thermogravimetry results showed that the materials are thermally stable up to approximately 160 °C. Differential scanning calorimeter studies were performed to study the influence of the length of EO units on the glass transition temperatures of the materials. The conductivity isotherms exhibit Vogel-Tamman-Fulcher behavior with a maximum proton conductivity of σ = 2 × 10-2 S/cm at 110 °C for TMA-(Peg600-Imi)3. © Springer-Verlag 2008.