Flexible free-standing polyaniline/poly(vinyl alcohol) composite electrode with good capacitance performance and shape memory behavior

• Main Authors: Haiyan Du, Shaoze Liu, Feng You, Jinfeng Wang, Zhe Ren, Zemin Wu
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 2021-08-01
• Series: Progress in Natural Science: Materials International
• Subjects: Polyaniline; Poly (vinyl alcohol); Flexible free-standing; Polymer electrode; Shape memory behavior
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1002007121000848

The increasing demand for portable and flexible energy storage devices drives the development of flexible electrodes and electrolytes. The aim of this work is to fabricate the flexible free-standing polyaniline/poly (vinyl alcohol) (PANI/PVA) composite electrode with good capacitance performance and shape memory behavior. The electrodes were fabricated by chemical oxidation polymerization of aniline in porous PVA (P-PVA) films. The morphology, electrochemical and mechanical properties of PANI/P-PVA electrodes were studied by scanning electron microscope, cyclic voltammetry, galvanostatic charge-discharge, and tensile test etc. The results revealed that the flexible PANI/P-PVA-1 electrode had good specific capacitance of 173.86 ​mF ​cm−2 at 1 ​mA ​cm−2, with the capacitance retention of 70.16% after 4000 charge-discharge cycles. Besides, it had excellent heat-induced shape memory effect. The fixed shape could completely recover to its original shape within 10 ​s at 80 ​°C, which is above the glass transition temperature (75.89 ​°C) of PANI/P-PVA-1. The comparatively tensile strength (2.86 ​MPa) and high elongation at break (315.72%) indicated its outstanding flexibility. Up to 200 times folding had no effect on the electrochemical properties. The free-standing polymer electrodes with excellent comprehensive performance provide potential applications in flexible energy-storage devices, electronic encapsulation and high stretchable electric devices etc.