Oxidative formation of electroactive film from polypyridinyl complexes of ruthenium(II)-containing 3-(pyrrol-1-ylmethyl)pyridine

This work reports the oxidative electrochemical polymerization of the trans-[RuCl2(pmp)(4)] monomer, where pmp = 3-(pyrrol-1-ylmethyl) pyridine. Its galvanostatic and potentiodynamic electropolymerization produced strongly adhesive and electroactive films on platinum, palladium and optically transparent electrodes. The efficiency of the film formation indicated the existence of a strong correlation between the applied upper-limit value of the potential range applied and the number of cycles. Electrochemical studies show that the redox properties of poly-trans-[RuC2(pmp)(4)] are very similar to the monomer trans-[RuCl2(pmp)(4)] in solution. Morphology and thickness measurements studies were performed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Microprobe X-ray dispersive energy analysis (EDAX) on the polymeric surface has also been carried out. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science S.A.