Research on synthesis and conductivity of ferrocenyl Schiff base and its salt

Abstract

Abstract Ferrocenyl Schiff base was synthesized through the condensation of ferrocenecarboxaldehyde and p ‐phenylenediamine under neutral conditions, and then a new interesting category of organometallic charge transfer complex was obtained by the doping of ferrocenyl Schiff base with Fe 3+ , Al 3+ and Ti 3+ salts. The effects of the dosage of doping agent and doping temperature on the room‐temperature electric conductivity of samples were discussed; in addition, the temperature dependence of the electric conductivity of samples was studied, their structures and compositions were characterized by 1 H‐NMR spectra, infrared spectra, ultraviolet spectra and an electron probe X‐ray microanalyser. The results showed that the electric conductivity of sample can increase 4–5 orders of magnitude after doping with a metallic salt, and the electric conductivity has a positive temperature coefficient effect. The electrical activation energies of the complexes in the range 0.09–1.54 eV were calculated from Arrhenius plots, indicating their favourable semiconducting behaviour. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.