Dielectric and conductivity relaxations in PVAc based polymer electrolytes

The polymer electrolytes composed of a blend of poly (vinyl acetate) (PVAc) and poly (methylmethacrylate) (PMMA) as a host polymer and LiClO₄ as a salt are prepared by a solution casting technique. The formation of blend polymer- salt complex has been confirmed by FT-IR spectral studies. The conductivity- temperature plots are found to follow an Arrhenius nature. Arrhenius plot shows the decrease in activation energy with the increase in salt concentration. The dielectric behaviour of the sample is analysed using dielectric permittivity (ε′), dielectric loss (ε″) and electric modulus (M″) of the samples. The impedance cole- cole plot shows the high frequency semi- circle is due to the bulk effect of the material and the depression in the semicircle shows the non-Debye nature of the material. The bulk conductivity is found to vary between 2.5×10⁻⁵ Scm⁻¹ to 1.7×10⁻³ Scm⁻¹ with the increase of salt concentration of blend polymer samples. The migration energy derived from the dissipation factor is almost equal to the activation energy calculated from conductivity. The modulus spectrum of the samples shows the non-Debye behaviour of the polymer electrolyte films. The low frequency dispersion of the dielectric constant implies the space charge effects arising from the electrodes. Paper presented at the 2nd International Conference on Ionic Devices, Anna University, Chennai, India, Nov. 28–30, 2003.