Electrical properties of a new polymer/photoresist composite

A new technique for growing thin films of conducting polymer with arbitrary geometry on substrates compatible with the microelectronic technologies is proposed. The new procedure utilizes commercial photoresist patterns properly modified in a way to make them suitable for the oxidation of a large class of monomers. The technique was tested with pyrrole, obtaining thin films of a composite material (resist/polypyrrole) with high conductivity. The new material was optically, morphologically, and electrically characterized. Four probe resistors and Wheatstone microbridges were built in order to measure the resistance as a function of temperature and the resistance fluctuation spectral density, respectively. Analysis of the results on the basis of conduction models of disordered media is presented. The time stability of the electrical parameters was also investigated. (C) 1996 American Institute of Physics.