MAXS Facility helps pave the way for safer smaller batteries and fuel cells

A recent study, published in the journal Nature Materials, suggests a new and versatile kind of solid polymer electrolyte (SPE) that already has twice the proton conductivity of the current state-of-the-art material. It was led by Karen I. Winey, TowerBrook Foundation Faculty Fellow, professor and chair of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, and co-supervisor of the LRSM’s Multiple Angle X-ray Scattering (MAXS) facility.

This publication is the result of 10+ years of structural characterization of precise polyethylenes made possible by the MAXS facility.  MAXS was designed to incorporate a broad angular range to capture structural features from 0.26 to 80 nm, which is particularly important for acid- and ion-containing polymer that self-assemble into hierarchical structures.