Soft Materials Seminar - "Elucidating the Role of Alpha-Helices in Improving Ionic Conductivity Through Modulation of Side Chains and Tertiary Structure"

Towards the goal of polymeric solid-state electrolytes with high conductivities near room temperature, polymeric ionic liquids (PILs) with alpha-helical secondary structures were recently studied. Helical PILs were shown to have significantly increased Tg-normalized ionic conductivity over non-helical analogues, implying that the helical structure was responsible for the increase. The mechanism behind this increase is not fully understood, and the present work seeks to understand the role of the helical structure by changing the ionic side chains as well as investigating how alignment of the helical backbones affects conductivity.