Enhanced electrical conductivity of polyaniline films by postsynthetic DC high-voltage electrical field treatment

• Freshly prepared PANI films are dried in static high-voltage electrical field.
• This treatment affects the microstructure and conductivity of PANI films.
• The most stable sample exhibiting σ = 374 S/m was achieved using 1 kV/cm.
• Optical transmittance remains the same despite the increase of conductivity.

New approach of chemical bath deposition combined with drying of freshly polymerized PANI films in DC high-voltage static electrical field 0.6–2.7 kV/cm has been applied in present work. AFM and SEM microscopy revealed the significant changes of structure and morphology of PANI films, however the most important result of high-voltage treatment was the strong increase of conductivity of PANI films from 88 S/m for the reference sample untreated in high-voltage field up to 374 S/m for samples dried in the electric field (1.0 kV/cm). The dependence of PANI conductivity on the intensity of high-voltage field showed the maximum conductivity for 1.0 kV/cm. Effects of corona discharge observed for high-voltage field intensity above 2.0 kV/cm on the samples are also presented. Results showed the possibility to change the nanostructure, morphology and conductivity using high-voltage electrical field.

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