9223390 Miller Three recent developments lead to this proposal. 1. The electrochemical preparation of a polymer with highly anisotropic conductivity. 2. The first example of self-assembly of ion- radicals into delocalized pi-stacks in solution. 3. The formation of aromatic (not aliphatic) self-assembled and Langmuir-Blodgett films. Using imides and their anion radicals, it is proposed to construct three types of unusual materials: conducting polymer films organized by pi-stacking; organized aromatic surface layers; and nanoscale dendrimers with conducting surfaces. These materials will be studied using electrochemistry, VIS, NIR, IR, XPS and ESR spectroscopy, grazing angle IR, VIS NIR linear dichroism, X-ray diffraction, DSC and conductivity measurements. The results promise to be significant in several regards. These new material types have little or no precedent, and the intermolecular organization provided by pi-stacking should provide unusual electrical and optical properties. It is expected that fundamentally new approaches to the synthesis of anisotropic bulk polymers and nanoscale materials will be revealed. ***
