Effect of reactive surfactant on the synthesis and optoelectronic properties of poly (3,4-ethylene dioxythiophene) dispersions

The aqueous phase synthesis of conducting polymers has received significant research interest in recent years as an environment friendly process. In this work, the chemical oxidative polymerization of 3, 4-ethylenedioxythiophene (EDOT) in presence of the anionic polymerizable surfactant (surfmer), viz., sulfonated 3-pentadecyl phenyl acrylate was studied. The polymerization was initiated with FeCl3/H2O2 catalyst system and stable, nanosized poly 3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene (PEDOT) dispersions with varying concentration of this surfmer were prepared. The effect of surfmer concentration on the dispersion characteristics and polymer properties was studied. The size of the nanoparticle, as measured by dynamic light scattering, decreases with increasing concentration of the reactive surfactant. The UV–VIS absorption spectra of the PEDOT polymers synthesized with the reactive surfactant is red shifted and the photoluminescence spectrum display broad emission characteristics. The cyclic voltammetry studies show a decrease of the specific capacitance for the samples prepared with the surfactant in comparison to that prepared without any surfactant. The thermal decomposition characteristics of the polymer was only marginally influenced by the reactive surfactant.