Correlations between Ion Conductivity and Polymer Dynamics in Hyperbranched Poly(ethylene oxide) Electrolytes for Lithium-Ion Batteries

Poly(ethylene oxide)s with varying degrees of hyperbranching are effective at preventing the crystallization of PEO and lead to approximately a 100-fold increase in the Li-ion conductivity below 50 °C as compared with linear PEO. The Li-ion conductivities, which increase further upon permethylation of the hydroxyl termini, are found to correlate quantitatively with the fast segmental dynamics of PEO as measured by inelastic neutron scattering.