Predicting water uptake in poly(perfluorosulfonic acids) using force field simulation methods

Free energy perturbation methods were applied to predict water contents in hydrated poly(perfluorosulfonic acids) (PPFSA). The simulations were based on the TEAM force field which was derived from quantum mechanical data calculated for small molecules using density functional theory (DFT) and thermodynamic data of molecular liquids and crystal. The equilibrium water contents in three PPFSA polymers (Nafion-117, Nafion-115 and Hyflon) were predicted by evaluating excess chemical potentials of water in hydrated polymers and in pure water. High level of precision measured by average uncertainty of ca. 0.1 kcal mol−1, and accuracy in terms of deviation from experimental data by ca. 0.2 kcal mol−1 were obtained in the predicted excess chemical potentials. The predicted amounts of water uptake agree well with experimental values. In addition, the equilibrium and dynamic properties of hydrated Nafion-117 were calculated and the results agree well with the existing experimental and computational data. The entropy and enthalpy contributions in the calculated excess chemical potentials are analyzed and the results are consistent with intuition. A linear correlation between the entropies and enthalpies is identified for the systems studied, which indicates that just increasing the interaction energies between water and host materials does not guarantee enhancement of the water uptake.