The Effect of Alkyl Spacers on the Mixed Ionic?Electronic Conduction Properties of N?Type Polymers

Conjugated polymers with mixed ionic and electronic transport are essential for developing the complexity function of electrochemical devices. Current n-type materials have a narrow scope low performance compared their p-type counterparts, requiring new molecular design strategies. This work presents two naphthalene diimide-bithiophene (NDI-T2) copolymers functionalized hybrid alkyl-glycol side chains, where diimide unit is segregated from ethylene glycol (EG) units within chain by an alkyl spacer. Introduction hydrophobic propyl hexyl spacers investigated as strategy to minimize detrimental swelling close conjugated backbone balance conduction properties in aqueous electrolytes. It found that both outperform analogue bearing EG-only chains organic transistors (OECTs). The presence also leads remarkable stability OECTs, no decrease ON current after 2 h operation. Through this versatile modification, provides greater understanding structure-property relationships required OECT operating media.