Porphyrin-Based Hole Conducting Electropolymer

MIGUEL GERVALDO, PAUL A. LIDDELL, JAMES W. BRIDGEWATER, AMY E. KEIRSTEAD, SU LIN, THOMAS A. MOORE, ANA L. MOORE, AND DEVENS GUST.

Phoenix, Arizona, USA

Congreso; 213th Meeting of The Electrochemical Society; 2008

The Electrochemical Society

Porphyrins and their relatives are among the most-studied organic chromophores, not only because of their roles as biological light absorbers, redox centers, and oxygen carriers but also because of their attractive chemical properties and potential technological applications. One useful way to interface porphyrins with electrodes or catalysts is to incorporate them into electrically conducting polymers that can move electrons or holes from the site of their generation to a conductor, modulate the transport of electrons between conductors, or otherwise transduce a molecular event into an electrical response. A convenient way to produce a conducting porphyrin polymer on an electrode is to grow it there via electropolymerization. Such a method is simple and ensures good electrical conductivity across the interface. Herein, we report the preparation of a new porphyrin monomer, (Figure 1), and its electropolymerization to form a hole-conducting film on metal or indium tin oxide (ITO) electrodes. Polymerization occurs via bonding of the aminophenyl nitrogen directly to the carbon atom at the 15-position of the porphyrin ring. Because of this unique polymerization mechanism, the porphyrin macrocycle is an integral part of the linear, conjugated, semiconducting polymer backbone. The polymer has interesting optical and electrochemical properties that suggest it might be useful for photovoltaic and sensing applications.