Polymerized Ionic Liquids: Solution Properties and Electrospinning

In this study, the solution properties and electrospinning of a polymerized ionic liquid was explored. Polymerized ionic liquids are synthesized from polymerizing ionic liquid monomers, where ionic liquids are of great interest due to their unique physiochemical properties. Compared to other polyelectrolyte solutions, this polymerized ionic liquid Solution exhibits similar viscosity scaling relationships in the semidilute unentangled and semidilute entangled regimes. However, the electrospraying-electrospinning transition occurs at similar polymer solution concentrations compared to neutral polymers, where electrospinning produced beaded fibers and defect-free fibers at similar to 1.25 and similar to 2 times the entanglement concentration, respectively. Due to high solution conductivities, electrospinning produces fibers approximately an order of magnitude smaller than neutral polymers at equivalent normalized Solution concentrations. In addition, a high ionic conductivity of the solid-state fiber mat was observed under dry conditions and even higher conductivities were observed for polyelectrolyte fiber mats produced from electrospinning polyelectrolyte-ionic liquid solutions, where both anion and cation are mobile species.