%0 Journal Article
%T Effect of Polyvinyl Alcohol on the Growth, Structure, Morphology, and Electrical Conductivity of Polypyrrole Nanoparticles Synthesized via Microemulsion Polymerization
%A Anurag Krishna
%A Amit Kumar
%A Rajiv Kumar Singh
%J ISRN Nanomaterials
%D 2012
%R 10.5402/2012/809063
%X Polypyrrole (PPy) nanoparticles were synthesized via microemulsion polymerization technique using sodium dodecyl sulfate as surfactant. Polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) was added as soft template during polymerization to modify the structure and properties of PPy nanoparticles. The synthesized materials namely, PVA-free and PVA added were characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and DC electrical conductivity measurements. The sample synthesized in the presence of PVA has longer conjugation length as estimated from FT-IR investigation. Temperature dependence (4.2¨C300£¿K) of DC electrical conductivity measurement reveals that the PVA has a strong effect on the polymerization mechanism of PPy giving evidence of H-bonded assistance during polymerization leading to the synthesis of better ordered polymer. A growth mechanism has been proposed which explains the H-bonded assistance of PPy polymerization leading to enhanced structural ordering. 1. Introduction Conjugated polymers have attracted considerable attention in the past few decades because of their potential application in electronic devices [1]. Their ease of processing and chemically tunable properties makes them useful for electronic, optoelectronic, electromechanical, and sensing device application [2, 3]. During the recent years conducting polymer nanostructures have received increasing attention from both fundamental research as well as application point of view. Conducting polymer nanostructures show high electrical conductivity, large surface area, short path lengths for the transport of ions, and high electrochemical activity as compared to its macrogranular structure or self-supporting films [4¨C7]. It can be synthesized by several approaches such as well-controlled solution synthesis [8, 9], soft-template methods [10], hard-template methods [11], and electrospinning technology [12]. Recently some conducting polymer nanowires and nanorods have been synthesized via hydrogen bonding [13]. Polypyrrole (PPy) is one of the most studied conducting polymers because of its good environmental stability, facile synthesis, ion exchange capacity, biocompatibility, and higher conductivity [14, 15]. It can be used in drug delivery, rechargeable batteries, supercapacitors, anhydrous electrorheological fluids, microwave shielding, and corrosion protection [16¨C18]. Soft template uses microemulsion polymerization which allows particles to transfer into spherical aggregates through the surfactant template for the production of PPy
%U http://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn.nanomaterials/2012/809063/