This research is a comprehensive program of magnetic resonance, spectroscopic and structural studies on conducting polymers. It will focus on specific polymer systems: 1) High-quality materials with relatively high molecular weight which are chain aligned and have relatively high crystallinity in the solid state; examples include polyaniline, PPV (and its derivatives), and PTV. 2) Polymers which are processible either as conjugated systems from solution or in precursor form from solution (or both, as in the case of the substituted PPV). The research includes the following: dilute one-dimensional chains of polyaniline in solution: small-angle Neutron scattering from Polyaniline in solution in sulfuric acid: molecular-weight dependences of the electronic properties of polyaniline: ESR measurements of PPV (and derivatives) to monitor conversion from prepolymer to conjugated polymer: electronic and optical Properties of molten conjugated polymers; ESR Studies of polarons and bipolarons in high-quality polymers with a nondegenerate ground state; polarons and bipolarons in dihexyloxy-PPV in solution; determination of whether or not heavily doped PPV (and derivatives) and PTV are true metals; forced Rayleigh scattering by conjugated polymers in solution; and crystal structures and chain packing in highly ordered conducting polymers.
