Water-Processable Conducting Polymers

Abstract

Until recently, most organic conducting polymers suffered from the lack of processability which is a prerequisite for their use in most technological applications. Furthermore, processability is of importance for the study of the polymers’ intrinsic properties. Because of the rigid nature of their backbones, processing of most of the initial undoped systems was unsuccessful. For doped polymers, the difficulties were even greater because doping causes further aggregation due to inc-reased interchain interaction and certain local geometry changes of the chains. Therefore, we have utilized various methods to achieve processability, directly or indirectly. The discussion is limited to the use of small or polymeric surfactant molecules grafted or physically adsorbed onto the conducting polymer chain or particle. Both, solutions and colloidal dispersions are the subject of this brief discussion.