Coadsorption of ferrocene-terminated and unsubstituted alkanethiols on gold: Electroactive self-assembled monolayers

Journal Article · Wed May 23 00:00:00 EDT 1990 · Journal of the American Chemical Society; (USA)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1021/ja00167a028· OSTI ID:6659686

Chidsey, C E.D.; Bertozzi, C R; Putvinski, T M; Mujsce, A M ^[1]

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1. AT T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ (USA)

Self-assembled monolayers provide an ideal system for disentangling the fundamental events in interfacial electron transfer. Coadsorption of ferrocene-terminated alkanethiols with unsubstituted n-alkanethiols on evaporated gold films yields stable, electroactive self-assembled monolayers. Monolayers containing low concentrations of alkanethiols linked to ferrocene by a polar ester group (FcCO{sub 2}(CH{sub 2}){sub n}SH, Fc = ({eta}{sup 5}-C{sub 5}H{sub 5})Fe({eta}{sup 5}-C{sub 5}H{sub 4})) show thermodynamically ideal surface electrochemistry in 1 M HClO{sub 4}, indicating the ferrocene groups to be homogeneous and noninteracting. Higher surface concentrations or use of alkanethiols linked directly to the nonpolar ferrocene group (Fc(CH{sub 2}){sub n}SH) lead to broadened electrochemical features, indicating interactions among ferrocene groups or inhomogeneous sites. Longer chain lengths and lower ferrocene surface concentrations result in slower electron-transfer kinetics with the ferrocene groups. A fraction of the thiols in a monolayer exchange with thiols in an ethanol solution, but much of the monolayer remains unequilibrated after 10 days.

• OSTI ID: 6659686
• Journal Information: Journal of the American Chemical Society; (USA), Vol. 112:11; ISSN 0002-7863
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

37 INORGANIC
ORGANIC
PHYSICAL AND ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY
ELECTRON TRANSFER
THIOLS
ADSORPTION
DATA ANALYSIS
ELECTROCHEMISTRY
EXPERIMENTAL DATA
GOLD
MEASURING INSTRUMENTS
MEASURING METHODS
CHEMISTRY
DATA
ELEMENTS
INFORMATION
METALS
NUMERICAL DATA
ORGANIC COMPOUNDS
ORGANIC SULFUR COMPOUNDS
SORPTION
TRANSITION ELEMENTS
400400* - Electrochemistry