Functionalized Conducting Polymers—Towards Intelligent Materials

Abstract

Organic conjugated polymers and oligomers constitute a three-dimensional network of molecular wires, in which all monomeric units can be functionalized with various prosthetic groups. By varying the nature of these groups, specific interactions with external physical or chemical phenomena can be developed in these materials, leading to molecular devices such as sensors, transducers, memories and logic operators. Chemists have already mastered the realization of many of these functional elements, which mimic those existing in organized beings. The further assembly of these elements in multifunctionalized organic conducting polymers and oligomers will represent the next step towards intelligent materials.

Influence of Chemical and Structural Properties of Functionalized Polythiophene‐Based Layers on Electrochemical Sensing of Atrazine

“…The great potential of conducting polymers (CPs) which exhibit high intrinsic electrical conductivity has long been recognized [1][2][3] for a number of applications, such as charge storage devices, [4] actuators, [5] bio-or gas sensors, [6] and ion-selective electrodes. [7] In addition, CPs have become prospective materials for bioanalytical and biosensor technologies.…”

Potentiometric Ion Sensors Based on Conducting Polymers

“…Polymerization of dibenzo-crown ethers with cation-complexing properties opened a new way for the construction of ion-complexing conducting polymers [52,53]. Ion-selectivity was induced into conducting polymers also by using functional dopants like tetrasulfonated dibenzo-18-crown-6 [54] or by covalent binding of ionrecognition sites as side-groups to the conducting polymer backbone [55,56].…”

Potentiometric Ag+ Sensors Based on Conducting Polymers: A Comparison between Poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) and Polypyrrole Doped with Sulfonated Calixarenes

“…Very recently, poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (PEDOT) doped with sulfonated calix [4]arene and calix [4]resorcarenes with different alkyl substituents were studied as potentiometric sensors for inorganic and organic cations [14]. All the PEDOT-based sensors were found to be selective to Ag þ .…”

“…In the present work, the potentiometric response of PEDOTand PPy doped with p-sulfonic calix [4]arene (C4S), p-sulfonic calix [6]arene (C6S), p-sulfonic calix [8]arene (C8S) and poly(styrene sulfonate) (PSS) are compared. The main objective of this work is to study the effects of the chemical structure of the conjugated polymer backbone and the size (and charge) of the sulfonated calixarene dopants on the selectivity of conducting polymer-based potentiometric Ag þ sensors.…”

“…A versatile approach is to use conducting polymers as ion-to-electron transducers in combination with immobilized ion recognition sites that induce selectivity. In principle, the ion recognition sites may be either covalently bound to the conducting polymer backbone [4] or entrapped as doping ions in the conducting polymer matrix [5], resulting in sensor materials where ion recognition and signal transduction are closely integrated. Different types of ion-recognition sites, including metallochromic indicators [6], sulfonated macrocycles [7], neutral carriers [8], charged carriers [9] and classical ion-exchangers [10] have been immobilized in conducting polymers in order to obtain novel potentiometric ion sensors.…”