Molecular dynamics study of nanocomposite polymer electrolyte based on poly(ethylene oxide)/LiBF<sub>4</sub>
Oleg Borodin; Grant D Smith; Rajdip Bandyopadhyaya; Paul Redfern; Larry A Curtiss
Журнал:
Modelling and Simulation in Materials Science and Engineering
Дата:
2004-05-01
Аннотация:
Interactions of Li<sup>+</sup> and ions with TiO<sub>2</sub> clusters were investigated using ab initio quantum chemistry methods. Classical force fields have been developed for poly(ethylene oxide)/LiBF<sub>4</sub>/TiO<sub>2</sub>, and molecular dynamics simulations have been performed on poly(ethylene oxide)/LiBF<sub>4</sub> polymer electrolyte with and without embedded TiO<sub>2</sub> nanoparticles using the developed force field. Addition of a TiO<sub>2</sub> nanoparticle to PEO/LiBF<sub>4</sub> solid polymer electrolyte resulted in the formation of a highly structured layer with a thickness of 5–6 Å that had more than an order of magnitude slower mobility than that of bulk PEO/LiBF<sub>4</sub>. The PEO and ions in the layers extending from 6 to 15 Å from the TiO<sub>2</sub> nanoparticle also revealed some structuring and reduced dynamics, whereas the PEO/LiBF<sub>4</sub> located further than 15 Å was basically unaffected by the presence of the TiO<sub>2</sub> nanoparticle. Both cations and anions tended to form a region with an increased concentration in the interfacial layers extending from 5 to 15 Å. No ions were dissolved by the first interfacial layer of PEO. Addition of a nanoparticle with soft-repulsion interactions with PEO resulted in the formation of a PEO interfacial layer with reduced PEO density but increased ion concentration. The PEO and ion mobility in the interfacial layer next to the soft-repulsive nanoparticle were higher than those of bulk PEO/LiBF<sub>4</sub> by 20–50%, whereas the conductivity of the nanocomposite electrolyte with the soft-repulsive particle increased only by 10%.
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