Temperature-Induced Evolution of Micro-Morphology of Polyaniline Prepared by Gradually Adding Oxidants: Experiments and Mechanism

This research aims to investigate the morphology evolution of polyaniline prepared by gradually adding oxidants at different temperatures. Results showed that the polyaniline nanofibers can readily be acquired when increasing the temperature from 25 to 75 degrees C by gradual oxidants addition, even using 5 M LiCl solution as a solvent. The further study revealed that the morphology evolution of polyaniline at temperature 75 degrees C follows the mechanism of continuously preferential homogeneous oxidation nucleation, which remarkably differs from the well-known secondary growth mechanism. Moreover, this morphology evolution mechanism led by temperature effect may be applied for the general synthesis of the nanostructures of other conjugated conducting polymers. (C) 2014 Society of Plastics Engineers