IntroductionThis chapter covers recent original research on polypyrrole, especially that pertaining to the last four or five years. It focuses on the synthesis and electrochemical properties of polypyrrole and polypyrrole derivatives, at the same time describing some interesting chemical syntheses and related composites. Physicochemical properties and related applications are mainly discussed, with a brief mention of the field of related biosensors and bioactive polymers. In fact, a more detailed discussion on these topics would make this article too long; moreover, there are several chapters in this book that are dedicated to this area.Since its original discovery by Diaz et al. [1a], polypyrrole progressively tends to become an old polymer. Meanwhile, the trend of the whole polypyrrole related research field follows its way, including many more technical progresses and focusing more on precise applications. However, it is possible to distinguish major and minor fields within this area. While research on new monomers has slowed down, investigations of new polymerization methods, both chemically and electrochemically, are still being carried out. The field of electrochemistry, for example, has seen a notable breakthrough in the use of ionic liquids for electrochemical synthesis, and there is a clear increase in research in the direction of syntheses of all kinds of prestructured media such as templates, emulsions, gels, nanoparticles arrays, membranes, and so on. After the initial excitement on research in the field of accumulators, enthusiasm in this area of application has dwindled; however, related applications such as supercapacitors continue to stimulate a steady amount of research work. Furthermore, the main focus of scientists is now on applications, especially on the design of polypyrrole derivatives fitted to specific purposes.Interesting reviews covering this field have appeared in recent years [1b,c]. These will be referred to in the chapter.This chapter is divided into three parts. The first part discusses the advances in polypyrrole synthesis, including new original monomers that appeared in the last five years, new polymerization procedures, and composites; a few recent fundamental studies on redox processes in polypyrrole are also mentioned. The
Electropolymerization: Concepts, Materials and Applications. Edited by Serge Cosnier and Arkady Karyakin