TY - JOUR
T1 - Investigation of the mechanism of a facile method for ammonia treatment to effectively tune the morphology and conductivity of PEDOT:PSS films
AU - Hsieh, Chung Hui
AU - Huang, Chien Hao
AU - Chu, Po Lun
AU - Chu, Sheng Yuan
AU - Chen, Peter
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was financially supported by the Hierarchical Green-Energy Materials (Hi- GEM ) Research Center, from The Featured Areas Research Center Program within the framework of the Higher Education Sprout Project by the Ministry of Education (MOE) and the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST 109-2634-F-006-020) in Taiwan. This research was supported in part by Higher Education Sprout Project, Ministry of Education to the Headquarters of University Advancement at National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) . Peter Chen acknowledges the financial support of the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan ( MOST 107-2221-E-006 -190 -MY3, MOST 108-2218-E-006 -043 -MY3). Sheng-Yuan Chu acknowledges the financial support from the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan ( MOST 109-2221-E-006 -156).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2021/4
Y1 - 2021/4
N2 - Although there are some advantages of PEDOT:PSS films, including high conductivity, high transparency to visible light, excellent water solubility, and being environmentally-friendly, PEDOT:PSS solutions are acidic owing to the PSS polymer with a –SO3H group donating the hydrogen ions. This results in the etching of the ITO surface as the PEDOT:PSS films are deposited on the ITO substrates using a spin coating process, which is attributed to the migration of indium and tin into the PEDOT:PSS film. In this paper, a PEDOT:PSS solution was treated with ammonia with different volume ratios prior to deposition. It is found that ammonia treatments can totally neutralize the hydrogen ions and reduce the AIn3+/AIn3+(pristine) atomic area ratio of PEDOT:PSS surface calculated from the XPS data due to the inhibition of the degradation at the PEDOT:PSS/ITO layer interface. Furthermore, the ASO3H/ASO3− on the PEDOT:PSS surface obviously changes with ammonia-treated solution at pH < 7, and APEDOT/APSS is greatly influenced by an ammonia-treated solution at pH > 7, which affects the surface energy of PEDOT:PSS film, helps improve the film roughness, and enhances the electrical conductivity of the films.
AB - Although there are some advantages of PEDOT:PSS films, including high conductivity, high transparency to visible light, excellent water solubility, and being environmentally-friendly, PEDOT:PSS solutions are acidic owing to the PSS polymer with a –SO3H group donating the hydrogen ions. This results in the etching of the ITO surface as the PEDOT:PSS films are deposited on the ITO substrates using a spin coating process, which is attributed to the migration of indium and tin into the PEDOT:PSS film. In this paper, a PEDOT:PSS solution was treated with ammonia with different volume ratios prior to deposition. It is found that ammonia treatments can totally neutralize the hydrogen ions and reduce the AIn3+/AIn3+(pristine) atomic area ratio of PEDOT:PSS surface calculated from the XPS data due to the inhibition of the degradation at the PEDOT:PSS/ITO layer interface. Furthermore, the ASO3H/ASO3− on the PEDOT:PSS surface obviously changes with ammonia-treated solution at pH < 7, and APEDOT/APSS is greatly influenced by an ammonia-treated solution at pH > 7, which affects the surface energy of PEDOT:PSS film, helps improve the film roughness, and enhances the electrical conductivity of the films.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.orgel.2021.106081
DO - 10.1016/j.orgel.2021.106081
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85100274413
SN - 1566-1199
VL - 91
JO - Organic Electronics
JF - Organic Electronics
M1 - 106081
ER -