Preparation of poly(carbazole-TEMPO) electrode and its electrochemical performance

Abstract Carbazole monomer with a side chain nitroxyl radical 4-(9H-carbazol-9-yl)acetyl-oxy-2,2,6,6-tetramethylpiperidin-1-yloxy (Cz-TEMPO), was designed and synthesized successfully. The corresponding polymer electrode poly(carbazole-TEMPO) (PCz-TEMPO) has been electrochemically prepared in CH3CN solution with different supporting electrolytes. PCz-TEMPO film was homogeneously dispersed on the surface of Pt electrode and characterized by FTIR, SEM, XPS and element mapping. The electrocatalytic performances of PCz-TEMPO electrode for oxidation of benzyl alcohol were investigated by cyclic voltammetry and in situ FTIR spectroscopy. Tetrabutylammonium tetrafluoroborate (TTFB) was the most efficient supporting electrolyte for preparing PCz-TEMPO electrode among the four supporting electrolytes. In addition, the electroactivity of PCz-TEMPO-TTFB electrode remained 94.6% after 100 scanning cycles in 0.1 M NaClO4/CH3CN solution.