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SUMMARY:Ionic Liquids in Phase Separating Block Copolymer Systems – Inves
 tigations of Morphologies and Membranes
LOCATION:A101
TZID:America/Denver
DTSTART:20185001T000000
UID:2026-04-21-16-41-53@natsci.colostate.edu
DTSTAMP:20260421T164153
Description:Room temperature ionic liquids (RTILs) have been a major focal 
 point in many areas of chemistry and engineering due to their favorable pr
 operties and emerging capabilities. RTILs are popular as solvents for gree
 n chemistry due to their near-zero vapor pressure and negligible flammabil
 ity. Their high ionic conductivity\, stability\, and selectivity for certa
 in light gases make them attractive for energy applications such as batter
 ies and post-combustion gas separation membranes. In circumstances where t
 he mechanical properties of a solid polymer are more desirable\, researche
 rs have turned to polymerized ionic liquids (PILs)\, or polymers that inco
 rporate a portion of the ionic liquid into each repeat unit of the polymer
  chain. Some PIL homopolymers\, however\, remain quite liquid like\, a pro
 blem which can be solved by integrating the PIL into a phase separating bl
 ock copolymer (BCP) architecture that takes advantage of the physical prop
 erties of two or more unique polymers. Additionally\, the BCP phase separa
 tion process can produce nanostructures that can dramatically change the m
 acroscopic properties of the material. For each new PIL BCP that is synthe
 sized\, a thorough investigation of the morphological phase separation beh
 avior is necessary to fully understand the material to facilitate further 
 use in application based research.\n\nRTILs can also be incorporated into 
 non-ionic BCPs by forming composite ion gel membranes. We utilize a sphere
 -forming\, poly(styrene-b-ethylene oxide) diblock and triblock copolymer b
 lend that can form a highly regular\, physically crosslinked\, highly elas
 tic network capable of selectively solvating the ionic liquid and maintain
 ing good mechanical properties even at RTIL content of over 90% by mass.1 
 However\, minor flaws or tears in the gel can cause catastrophic failure o
 f the material when under mechanical stress. We aim to prevent crack and t
 ear propagation in these ion gels by chemically modifying chain ends with 
 the capability to preferentially break under stress and immediately cataly
 ze the formation of new tethers between crosslinked domains to prevent pro
 pagation of tears through the material.\n\n&nbsp\;\n\n(1)         
  Wijayasekara\, D. B.\; Cowan\, M. G.\; Lewis\, J. T.\; Gin\, D. L.\; Nobl
 e\, R. D.\; Bailey\, T. S. Elastic Free-Standing RTIL Composite Membranes 
 for CO2/N2 Separation Based on Sphere-Forming Triblock/Diblock Copolymer B
 lends. J. Memb. Sci. 2016\, 511\, 170–179 4:00 pm
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