Research and development in the field of conducting polymers can enable advancement in
flexible electronics. Particularly polyaniline has been given importance due to stability, easy
synthesis, reasonable conductivity and tunable properties by changing oxi
dation states.
We have presented a systematic study of effect polymerization time and temperature on
polyaniline morphology and conductivity. It was noticed that with decrease in polymerization
temperature and increase in polymerization duration, conducti
vity of polyaniline increases. It
was seen that particle size of polyaniline plays an important role in determining conductivity,
irrespective of crystallinity, which suggests equal probability of electron conduction along and
between the polyaniline chain
s. The highest conductivity obtained was for 24 hours of
polymerisation in temperature (
-
18
̊
C).
Conducting polymers including polyaniline possess poor mechanical properties. Cellulosic
materials were chosen as substrate because of abundance, bio compatibility, biodegradability,
and low cost. . Polyaniline was impregnated into corn cob cover by
in sit
u
polymerization to
prepare composite. The conductivity was measured to be 8×10
-
4
S/cm for 15 % of polyaniline
in the sample.
Bacterial cellulose was chosen as another substrate because of its purity,
mechanical properties and tenability. Composites of poly
aniline and bacterial cellulose were
also made by
in situ
polymerization. Three types of bacterial celluloses with variation in
microstructure and porosity were used. The best conductivity was found to be 2×10
-
3
S/cm for
over 50%
of polyaniline
