Rapid formation of well-ordered self-assembled monolayers of dodecanethiol on polycrystalline gold by microwave irradiation

This article reports a rapid method of preparing self-assembled monolayers of dodecanethiol (C12SH-SAMs) on polycrystalline gold by microwave irradiation (MWI, 650 W, duty cycle is 10%). The qualities of C12SH-SAMs were characterized by both cyclic voltammetry (CV) and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). The results show that the C12SH-SAMs formed by MWI in 120 s (C12SH-SAMsMWI,120 s) have low ionic permeability (the differential capacitance Cd values are independent of the scan rate and phase angle at 1 Hz Φ1 Hz = 89 ± 0.9°), excellent electrochemical blocking ability towards the redox probe (the current iMWI,120 s obtained from CV is lowest when compared to other SAMs and charge transfer resistance Rct = (1.15 ± 0.19) × 106 Ω cm2), and high surface coverage (99.996 ± 0.001%).