Co-continuous Polymer Blend Based Lithium-Ion Conducting Gel-Polymer Electrolytes

In this work we report the synthesis and characterization of gel-polymer electrolytes based on co-continuous polymer blends. Such blends are characterized by a bicontinuous morphology consisting of two three-dimensionally interpenetrated polymer networks. Co-continuous polymer blends are simply formed by hot-blending two immiscible polymers. The intrinsic advantage of co-continuous polymer blends consists in the possibility of selecting the polymers. One polymer ( e.g. , polystyrene) imparts the desired mechanical properties and the other polymer [ e.g. , poly(ethylene oxide)] enables the ionic conductivity via formation of a gel which contains the electrolytic solution.