Selective vapor-phase deposition of conductive poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) thin films on patterned FeCl3 formed by microcontact printing

Abstract

We demonstrate a selective vapor-phase deposition of conductive poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (PEDOT) thin films on patterned FeCl3. The PEDOT thin films were grown on various substrates by using the vapor-phase polymerization of ethylenedioxythiophene (EDOT) with FeCl3 catalytic layers at 325 K. The selective deposition of the PEDOT thin films using vapor-phase polymerization was accomplished with patterned FeCl3 layers as templates. Microcontact printing was done to prepare Patterned FeCl3 on polyethyleneterephthalate (PET) substrates. The selective vapor-phase deposition is based on the fact that the PEDOT thin films are selectively deposited only on the regions exposing FeCl3 of the PET substrates, because the EDOT monomer can be polymerized only in the presence of oxidants, such as FeCl3, Fe(ClO4), and iron(II) salts of organic acids/inorganic acids containing organic radicals.