Fabrication of monolithic microstructures from polyaniline nanofibers

Due to the expanding research efforts in the field of nanomanufacturing, more techniques are being developed for the manipulation and directed deposition of nanomaterials into functional device platforms. Electrophoretic deposition has been a reliable method for ordering and aligning 0-D (spherical) and 1-D (fibers and wires) nanomaterials, but to date this technique has not been used as a method of bottom-up fabrication for larger coherent microstructures. The end products are either single element devices or non-coherent films and patterns. The work reported herein describes the fabrication of monolithic microstructures from nanofibers of the conducting polymer, polyaniline. Electrophoretic deposition techniques are used to pattern the nanofibers and through a subsequent flash-welding process the nanofiber mat can be bound together into a coherent monolithic porous structure retaining much of the morphology of non-coherent fiber networks. Applications for these structures are also discussed.