Low temperature resistivity study of nanostructured polypyrrole films under electronic excitations

The synthesis of nanostructured polypyrrole (Ppy) films by electrochemical process and their modifications by electronic excitations induced by swift heavy ion irradiations is reported in this paper. The electrical property of ion beam irradiated polypyrrole was investigated at low temperature by resistivity measurements. The structural and optical properties were also studied using X-ray diffraction (XRD), UV-vis spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). At low temperature, the polypyrrole films show the metallic behaviour after ion beam irradiation. UV-vis spectroscopy shows a red shift in the absorbance edge and thus reduction in band gap with increasing ion fluence. The structural studies show that the percentage crystallinity improves with increase in ion fluence. The SEM study corroborates the results of structural analysis and shows the formation of rod type structures along with the evolution of amorphous phase with increasing ion fluence.