Multifunctional π-conjugated poly (3-methylthiophene) nanotubes for optoelectronic and field emissive devices

Abstract Multifunctional properties of nanomaterials becomes a hot topic in nano research for the development of multifunctional devices, because modern devices need multifunctional platform for the high efficient plural performance on a single device. Here, we introduce a multifunctional π-conjugated poly (3-methylthiophene) (P3MT) nanotube (NT), showing controllable optical and electrical properties through the control of doping level. P3MT NTs were electrochemically synthesized in the low temperature (−40 °C) on the nanoporous template. The change of doping level by post cyclic voltammetry (CV) treatment on the P3MT lead the variance of polaron/bipolaron band, resulting into the drastic change of ultraviolet-visible absorption and photoluminescence properties. While P3MT NTs before CV treatment show an ohmic behavior in the current-voltage characteristics, those after CV treatment show high photocurrent. From the field emission experiment, the P3MT NTs before CV treatment have a relatively low turn-on electric field and stable electron emission property compared to the P3MT NTs after CV treatment. This shows that the π-conjugated polymers should be shed new light on their multifunctionality for the potential application to the multifunctional platform of opto-electronic nanodevices.