Bulk-like and Interfacial Water Dynamics in Nafion Fuel Cell Membranes Investigated with Ultrafast Nonlinear IR Spectroscopy

Roget, Sean A.; Kramer, Patrick L.; Thomaz, Joseph E.; Fayer, Michael D.

doi:10.1021/acs.jpcb.9b07592

Title: Bulk-like and Interfacial Water Dynamics in Nafion Fuel Cell Membranes Investigated with Ultrafast Nonlinear IR Spectroscopy

Journal Article · Thu Oct 03 00:00:00 EDT 2019 · Journal of Physical Chemistry. B, Condensed Matter, Materials, Surfaces, Interfaces and Biophysical Chemistry

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jpcb.9b07592· OSTI ID:1598361

Roget, Sean A. ^[1]; Kramer, Patrick L. ^[1]; Thomaz, Joseph E. ^[1];

^[1]

Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Dept. of Chemistry

The water confined in the hydrophilic domains of Nafion fuel cell membranes is central to its primary function of ion transport. Water dynamics are intimately linked to proton transfer and are sensitive to the structural features and length scales of confinement. Here, ultrafast polarization-selective pump-probe and two-dimensional infrared vibrational echo (2D IR) experiments were performed on fully hydrated Nafion membranes with sodium counterions to explicate the water dynamics. Like aerosol-OT reverse micelles (AOT RMs), the water dynamics in Nafion are attributed to bulk-like core water in the central region of the hydrophilic domains and much slower interfacial water. Population and orientational dynamics of water in Nafion are slowed by polymer confinement. Comparison of the observed dynamics to those of AOT RMs helps identify local interactions between water and sulfonate anions at the interface and among water molecules in the core. This comparison also demonstrates that the well-known spherical cluster morphology of Nafion is not appropriate. Spectral diffusion of the interfacial water, which arises from structural dynamics, was obtained from the 2D IR experiments taking the core water to have dynamics similar to bulk water. Like the orientational dynamics, spectral diffusion was found to be much slower at the interface compared to bulk water. Together, the dynamics indicate slow reorganization of weakly hydrogen-bonded water molecules at the interface of Nafion. We report these results provide insights into proton transport mechanisms in fuel cell membranes, and more generally, water dynamics near the interface of confining systems.

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Research Organization:: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC), Menlo Park, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES). Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences Division; National Science Foundation (NSF)

Grant/Contract Number:: AC02-76SF00515; DEFG03-84ER13251

OSTI ID:: 1598361

Journal Information:: Journal of Physical Chemistry. B, Condensed Matter, Materials, Surfaces, Interfaces and Biophysical Chemistry, Vol. 123, Issue 44; ISSN 1520-6106

Publisher:: American Chemical SocietyCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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Cited by: 20 works

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