Nanofibers and nanocomposites poly(3,4-ethylene dioxythiophene)/poly(styrene sulfonate) by electrospinning

Intrinsically conductive polymers such as PEDT are an important class of electroactive polymer being used in the form of films for electronic devices such as LED. In order to explore the feasibility of PEDT for wearable electronics, PEDT/PAN blend was converted to fibers and fibrous assemblies. Specifically PEDT polymer blends and their composites were converted to submicron and nanoscale fibers to explore the nanoscale effect on the conductivity of PEDT.; In order to organize the nanofibers to aligned and planar assemblies, various processing mechanisms were developed including "Dry Rotary Electrospinning" and "Self-assembled" yarn formation as well as non-woven random fiber mats. In order to optimize the electrospinning process, the fiber diameters of the PEDT fiber were correlated with polymer concentration.; The PEDT nanofibrous assemblies were characterized by Four-point probe electrical conductivity measurement and by microtensile testing. Confirming the significant effect of fiber diameter on electrical conductivity, a four-fold increase in electrical conductivity was observed as fiber diameter decrease from 260nm to 140nm.; To further explore advanced material concepts to introduce multiple functions to the electrospun yarn, single walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs), were successfully co-electrospun with PEDT/PAN blend. The inclusion of SWNTs shows s further increase its electrical conductivity of nanofibrous yarn and the tensile strength increased by 50%. The Presence of SWNTs were confirmed by Raman spectroscopy and HREM which also show good alignments of CNTs within the nanofibers. The carbon nanotubes reinforced PEDT nanofibrous yarn was woven into a fabric to demonstrate the feasibility of the electrospun yarn as an attractive enabling material for wearable electronics.