| Electrically conducting polymers or pi-conjugated polymers are currently one of the most promising materials that have attracted many researchers and technologists due to their ease of processability and unique properties useful for a myriad of industrial and practical applications. The increased in research about pi-conjugated polymers was enthused by the key enabling discovery that they can be converted into highly conducting metal-like materials by simple chemical or electrochemical treatment. Electropolymerization has gained much popularity in the synthesis of conducting polymer materials because the method is facile, inexpensive, and reproducible with high fidelity. This dissertation provides details about the synthesis, characterization, and use of electropolymerized conducting polymer materials to novel applications, in particular, to chemical sensing, patterning, and surface coatings. This work is described in the following chapters: Chapter 2 depicts the electrochemical synthesis of novel chemosensitive ultrathin molecularly imprinted films using a series of monofunctional and bifunctional H-bonding terthiophene and carbazole monomers for the non-covalent imprinting of naproxen, paracetamol, and theophylline drugs. Chapter 3 is more focused on the detection of theophylline drug and provides more detailed investigation on the innovative method of washing the template from the polymer film that involves the application of a constant electrochemical potential. Moreover, full sensor performance evaluation studies (sensitivity, selectivity, and stability) of the molecularly imprinted film are reported in this chapter. Theoretical modeling studies are performed through semi-empirical AM1 quantum calculations to determine the H-bonding interactions between the monomer and template and the formation of a stable pre-polymerization complex in solution prior to E-MIP film formation. Chapter 4 describes a facile and novel strategy towards binary composition two-dimensional patterned surfaces of conducting polymer periodic arrays side-by-side with thiol self-assembled monolayers (SAM)s or polymer brushes. Chapter 5 describes a facile approach for enabling or inhibiting the adsorption of protein and adhesion of bacterial cells on a potential-induced reversibly wettable poly(thiophene) film. The poly(thiophene) conducting polymer coating enables control on the wettability of the surface by simply changing its redox property via potential switching. Finally, Chapter 6 presents a global summary of the current research projects presented in this dissertation and provides some useful insights about future research directions. |
