Effect of clay on TiO2 embedded PMMA nanocomposite for high-performance energy storage application

Abstract

Present work deals with the dielectric and electrochemical properties of PMMA/TiO2 and PMMA/TiO2@Clay nanocomposite prepared via a simple sol-gel method followed by ultrasonication. With pore diameters of 16.657 Å, ternary nanocomposites have an increased specific surface area of 28.88 m2/g. The significant dielectric properties are observed for PMMA/TiO2 and PMMA/TiO2@Clay nanocomposite with the highest dielectric constant ε′ of 3.66 × 103 and 1.45 × 103 and maximum dielectric loss ε″ of 1.7 and 1.9 at 1 kHz respectively. The PMMA/TiO2 nanocomposite exhibits the highest σac conductivity of 1.29 × 10−4 S/m and 6.85 × 10−2 S/m, whereas; the PMMA/TiO2@Clay nanocomposite demonstrates the highest σac conductivity of 1.47 × 10−4 S/m and 1.84 × 10−2 S/m at 1 kHz and 3 MHz, respectively. The manufactured device's highest specific capacitance is 364.13 F/g, which corresponds to an energy density of 129.26 Wh/kg and a power density of 2913.04 W/kg. Even after 5000 CV cycles, a 97 % capacitance retention is reported in the cyclic stability. The present work proves its virtue and competency towards superior energy storage applications.