Bioinspired Nanostructures by Soft‐Template Electropolymerization from Di‐Substituted Triphenylamine

Abstract

We report a bioinspired approach to tune surface nanostructures by soft‐template electropolymerization in micellar conditions. Monomers highly favoring π‐stacking interactions are particularly interesting for favoring the polymer deposition in one direction. Here, original triphenylamine‐based monomers di‐substituted by thiophene and carbazole are investigated. Conjugated building blocks monomers are tested to favor deposition vs polymerization, even if the monomers are not perfectly planar. The carbazole derivatives have a much higher electrodeposition capacity than the thiophene derivatives, which is unexpected if thiophene and carbazole are taken alone. Moreover, in all electrodeposited films, monomer seems to be present as shown by cyclic voltammetry experiments, confirming previous works. The amount of monomer vs oligomers is highly dependent on the investigated monomer. For the resulting surface structures, hollow spheres and nanoribbons are particularly formed with some investigated monomers by cyclic voltammetry while nanotubes are observed at constant potential. The formation of nanotubes indicates a polymer growth more favored in one direction. These surfaces are less hydrophobic (water contact angle up to 111.5°) compared to films with spherical nanoparticles but these results can be explained only by the presence of air inside the surface roughness.