| Pacific Rim Symposium on Surfaces, Coatings and Interfaces (PacSurf 2018) | |
| Thin Films | Tuesday Sessions |
| Session TF-TuM |
| Session: | Innovations in the Development of Multifunctional Thin Films |
| Presenter: | Drew Evans, University of South Australia, Australia |
| Correspondent: | Click to Email |
Conducting polymers offer several key advantages over their inorganic counterparts, such as mechanical flexibility, transparency, and material abundance, which can enable low-cost fabrication and novel applications such as printed and flexible electronics. The conducting polymer poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene), PEDOT, is one material which displays (among others) high electrical conductivity [1], enhanced thermal conductivity [2], good electrocatalytic performance [3], as well as thermoelectric behaviour [4]. Enhancing the properties of PEDOT has been achieved through Vapour Phase Polymerisation (VPP), an oxidative polymerization process under vacuum conditions. We report that VPP PEDOT shows interesting interactions with anions, in some examples almost specific ion effects [5]. For example, the uptake of anions from an aqueous solution into electrochemically reduce PEDOT is highly dependent on the anion itself. More interestingly is nitrate is specifically absorbed by PEDOT when present in a mixed electrolyte solution [6]. This selective absorption is hypothesised to originate from anion-π interactions, in part validated by MD simulations [5]. Such interactions, relating to both chemistry and structure, lead to interesting opportunities in energy storage as well as (agricultural) sensing.
References:
[1] Fabretto MV, et al. "Polymeric material with metal-like conductivity for next generation organic electronic devices", Chem. Mater. 24, pp. 3998-4003, 2012.
[2] Weathers A, et al. "Significant Electronic Thermal Transport in the Conducting Polymer Poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene)", Adv. Mater. 27, pp. 2101-2106, 2015.
[3] Vucaj N, et al. "Vapor Phase Synthesis of Conducting Polymer Nanocomposites Incorporating 2D Nanoparticles", Chem. Mater. 26, pp. 4207-4213, 2014.
[4] Bubnova O, et al. "Semi-metallic polymers", Nat. Mater. 13, pp. 190-194, 2014.
[5] Rudd S, et al. “Charge transport and structure in semimetallic polymers”, J. Polym. Sci. B 56, pp. 97-104, 2018.
[6] Rudd S, et al. “Selective uptake and sensing of nitrate in poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene)”, Sci. Rep. 7, pp 16581, 2017.