Gated proton transport in aligned mesoporous silica films

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Abstract
Modulated proton transport plays significant roles in biological processes such as ATP synthesis as well as in technologically important applications including, for example, hydrogen fuel cells. The state-of-the-art proton-exchange membrane is the sulphonated tetrafluoroethylene copolymer Nafion developed by DuPont in the late 1960s, with a high proton conductivity. However, actively switchable proton conduction, a functional mimic of the ion transport within a cell membrane, has yet to be realized. Herein, we report the electrostatic gating of proton transport within aligned mesoporous silica thin film. It is observed that surface-charge-mediated transport is dominant at low proton concentrations. We have further demonstrated that the proton conduction can be actively modulated by two-fourfold with a gate voltage as low as 1 V. Such artificial gatable ion transport media could have potential applications in nanofluidic chemical processors, biomolecular separation and electrochemical energy conversion.