Electrical conductivity of polyazomethine/fullerene C60 nanocomposites

We prepared the polyazomethine/fullerene C60 nanocomposites varying in C60 loading. With a broadband dielectric relaxation spectrometer, we measured their electrical conductivity σm being a sum of dc conductivity σdc and ac conductivity σac. A small C60 content (0.25 and 0.5 wt.%) was shown to decrease σdc, whereas a larger amount of C60 (2.5 wt.%) was found to increase σdc of the nanocomposite. The temperature dependences of σac were described with the Arrhenius equation, while the frequency dependences of σac were characterized with a power function. The correlated barrier hopping was accepted as the most suitable mechanism to explain the σac behavior of the nanocomposites.