Ferrocene-containing poly(fluorenylethynylene)s for nonvolatile resistive memory devices

Four new conjugated ferrocene-containing poly(fluorenylethynylene)s (PFcFE1-PFcFE4) with triphenylamine, carbazole or thiophene moieties in the main chain have been designed and synthesized via a Sonogashira coupling reaction. Their structures, molecular weights, optical features, thermal properties and memory performance were well studied. Two terminal single layer devices (ITO/polymer/Al) based on PFcFE1, PFcFE2 and PFcFE3 exhibited flash memory behaviours, while PFcFE4 shared the common characteristics of the write-once read-many times'' (WORM) memory effect. These results would provide a new series of ferrocene-containing conjugated polymers with further opportunities for memory applications.