Details of Grant 

EPSRC Reference:	GR/R82432/01
Title:	The Structure of Polymer Electrolytes
Principal Investigator:	Bruce, Professor P
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Department:	Chemistry
Organisation:	University of St Andrews
Scheme:	Standard Research (Pre-FEC)
Starts:	01 November 2002	Ends:	31 October 2005	Value (£):	224,671
EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:	Materials Characterisation
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Summary on Grant Application Form
Polymer electrolytes consist of salts, e.g. Lil, dissolved in solid polymers, e.g. poly(ethylene oxide). Many thousands of such materials are known encompassing salts of alkali, alkali earth, transition metal and lanthanide ions. The rich diversity in their chemistry leads to many possible optical, magnetic and electrical properties. Such properties remain largely unexplored and unexplained, in part because the structures of polymer electrolytes have been notoriously difficult to establish. Polymer electrolytes do not yield good single crystal diffraction data. We have developed a powerful new method by which complete crystal structures maybe solved ab initio from powder diffraction data. This has, for the first time, permitted access to previously unobtainable polymer electrolyte structures. Recently we solved, for the first time, the structure of the 6:1 complexes poly(ethylene oxide)6:LiXF6, X=P,As,Sb. The structure is completely different from any known previously. Based on the structure we predicted, then proved that, in complete contrast to the established view, ionic conductivity can exist in crystalline polymer electrolytes. (Nature, 412, 520 (2001)). We now seek to capitalise on the new powerful crystallographic method we have developed, using it to extend substantially our fundamental understanding of polymer electrolyte structure including, for the first time di- and trivalent cation systems, something that was previously impossible. We also propose to build on the crystallographic studies by using them to obtain unprecedented insight into the structures of the analogous amorphous phases.
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Organisation Website:	http://www.st-and.ac.uk