Observation of Propagation Speed of Conductive Front in Electrochemical Doping Process of Polypyrrole Films

Abstract

Abstract According to the propagation theory of a conductive zone for the electrochemical doping process of conducting polymer films, an oxidized conductive zone works as an electrode for oxidizing the reduced non-conductive region and is propagated throughout the film under charge transfer control. This theory was verified for polypyrrole films by tracing the temporal and spatial variations of conductive regions in a film. An exhaustively reduced polypyrrole film was laid on an insulating glass plate and connected electrically to an ITO electrode at the marginal part. The film absorbance to a monochromatic light beam was monitored with a photodiode array detector at 14 segments of the film. When the potential of the ITO electrode was stepped to an oxidation potential of the film, an electrochemically oxidized conductive zone was propagated through the film with a manifest phase boundary. The distance from the edge of the ITO electrode to the front of the conductive zone increased linearly with time. The logarithmic slope of the propagation speed exhibited a linear relation to the applied potential.