Doping of polyaniline by transition metal salts: effect of metal cation on the film morphology

Transition metal salts have been employed as dopants leading to conductive polyaniline (PANI) films. These dopants were found to be able to interact with polyaniline chains directly and to induce changes in morphology of polyaniline films, thus leading to the metal cation-induced processibility of these films. It was found two opposite tendencies of doping, resulting in formation of conductive films with different morphologies. The typical salts leading to these opposite tendencies are NiCl2, EuCl3, on the one hand, and ZnCl2 on the other hand, respectively. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.