Simultaneous Improvement in Electrical Conductivity and Seebeck Coefficient of PEDOT:PSS by N Pressure-induced Nitric Acid Treatment

Overview

Journal RSC Adv

Publisher Royal Society of Chemistry

Specialty Chemistry

Date 2022 May 13

PMID 35558964

Authors

May Thu Zar Myint

Masaki Hada

Hirotaka Inoue

Tatsuki Marui

Takeshi Nishikawa

Yuta Nishina

Susumu Ichimura

Masayoshi Umeno

Aung Ko Ko Kyaw

Yasuhiko Hayashi

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

As a thermoelectric (TE) material suited to applications for recycling waste-heat into electricity through the Seebeck effect, poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(4-styrenesulfonic acid) (PEDOT:PSS) is of great interest. Our research demonstrates a comprehensive study of different post-treatment methods with nitric acid (HNO) to enhance the thermoelectric properties of PEDOT:PSS. The optimum conditions are obtained when PEDOT:PSS is treated with HNO for 10 min at room temperature followed by passing nitrogen gas (N) with a pressure of 0.2 MPa. Upon this treatment, PEDOT:PSS changes from semiconductor-like behaviour to metal-like behaviour, with a simultaneous enhancement in the electrical conductivity and Seebeck coefficient at elevated temperature, resulting in an increase in the thermoelectric power factor from 0.0818 to 94.3 μW m K at 150 °C. The improvement in the TE properties is ascribed to the combined effects of phase segregation and conformational change of the PEDOT due to the weakened coulombic attraction between PEDOT and PSS chains by nitric acid as well as the pressure of the N gas as a mechanical means.

Citing Articles

Green Conducting Cellulose Yarns for Machine-Sewn Electronic Textiles.

Darabi S, Hummel M, Rantasalo S, Rissanen M, Oberg Mansson I, Hilke H ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2020; 12(50):56403-56412.

PMID: 33284024 PMC: 7747218. DOI: 10.1021/acsami.0c15399.

Controlling Electronic States of Few-walled Carbon Nanotube Yarn via Joule-annealing and p-type Doping Towards Large Thermoelectric Power Factor.

Zar Myint M, Nishikawa T, Omoto K, Inoue H, Yamashita Y, Kyaw A Sci Rep. 2020; 10(1):7307.

PMID: 32350391 PMC: 7190723. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-64435-0.

References

Massonnet N, Carella A, de Geyer A, Faure-Vincent J, Simonato J . Metallic behaviour of acid doped highly conductive polymers. Chem Sci. 2017; 6(1):412-417. PMC: 5485340. DOI: 10.1039/c4sc02463j. View

Ibanez M, Luo Z, Genc A, Piveteau L, Ortega S, Cadavid D . High-performance thermoelectric nanocomposites from nanocrystal building blocks. Nat Commun. 2016; 7:10766. PMC: 4786643. DOI: 10.1038/ncomms10766. View

Culebras M, Igual-Munoz A, Rodriguez-Fernandez C, Gomez-Gomez M, Gomez C, Cantarero A . Manufacturing Te/PEDOT Films for Thermoelectric Applications. ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2017; 9(24):20826-20832. DOI: 10.1021/acsami.7b03710. View

Kim G, Shao L, Zhang K, Pipe K . Engineered doping of organic semiconductors for enhanced thermoelectric efficiency. Nat Mater. 2013; 12(8):719-23. DOI: 10.1038/nmat3635. View

Fan Z, Du D, Yu Z, Li P, Xia Y, Ouyang J . Significant Enhancement in the Thermoelectric Properties of PEDOT:PSS Films through a Treatment with Organic Solutions of Inorganic Salts. ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2016; 8(35):23204-11. DOI: 10.1021/acsami.6b07234. View

Bubnova O, Khan Z, Wang H, Braun S, Evans D, Fabretto M . Semi-metallic polymers. Nat Mater. 2013; 13(2):190-4. DOI: 10.1038/nmat3824. View

Zhou W, Fan Q, Zhang Q, Li K, Cai L, Gu X . Ultrahigh-Power-Factor Carbon Nanotubes and an Ingenious Strategy for Thermoelectric Performance Evaluation. Small. 2016; 12(25):3407-14. DOI: 10.1002/smll.201600501. View

Kamarudin M, Razey Sahamir S, Datta R, Long B, Sabri M, Said S . A review on the fabrication of polymer-based thermoelectric materials and fabrication methods. ScientificWorldJournal. 2013; 2013:713640. PMC: 3845840. DOI: 10.1155/2013/713640. View

Wang X, Kyaw A, Yin C, Wang F, Zhu Q, Tang T . Enhancement of thermoelectric performance of PEDOT:PSS films by post-treatment with a superacid. RSC Adv. 2022; 8(33):18334-18340. PMC: 9080561. DOI: 10.1039/c8ra02058b. View

10.

Mengistie D, Chen C, Boopathi K, Pranoto F, Li L, Chu C . Enhanced thermoelectric performance of PEDOT:PSS flexible bulky papers by treatment with secondary dopants. ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2014; 7(1):94-100. DOI: 10.1021/am507032e. View

11.

Oh H, Jang J, Kim J, Hong J, Kim J, Kwak J . Structural and Morphological Evolution for Water-resistant Organic Thermoelectrics. Sci Rep. 2017; 7(1):13287. PMC: 5643330. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-13726-0. View

12.

Wei Q, Mukaida M, Kirihara K, Naitoh Y, Ishida T . Recent Progress on PEDOT-Based Thermoelectric Materials. Materials (Basel). 2017; 8(2):732-750. PMC: 5455279. DOI: 10.3390/ma8020732. View

13.

Bubnova O, Khan Z, Malti A, Braun S, Fahlman M, Berggren M . Optimization of the thermoelectric figure of merit in the conducting polymer poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene). Nat Mater. 2011; 10(6):429-33. DOI: 10.1038/nmat3012. View

14.

Yu Z, Xia Y, Du D, Ouyang J . PEDOT:PSS Films with Metallic Conductivity through a Treatment with Common Organic Solutions of Organic Salts and Their Application as a Transparent Electrode of Polymer Solar Cells. ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2016; 8(18):11629-38. DOI: 10.1021/acsami.6b00317. View