Coupled water and polymer dynamics in a new polyamide membrane for Fuel Cell applications at intermediate and high temperature

Over the past decades, fuel cell research has grown exponentially with the continued development of new materials and systems for automotive and stationary applications. Proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) have experienced significant advancements due to their simplicity, environmental friendliness, high energy efficiency, and versatility. Unfortunately, most of the existing PEMs demonstrate high ion conductivity only at low temperatures. As a result, significant efforts are underway to effectively transition water filtration technology for the production of functionalised PA as IT/HT-PEMs. Further limitations arise from the limited knowledge about ion dynamics under operational conditions. Pioneering studies of water dynamics in PA membranes using QENS under operation conditions have been performed previously. In this proposal, we seek to expand our study investigating the feasibility of a new fuel cell design to characterise H+ and water dynamics in a commercial AEM membrane.