XPS study of the leucoemeraldine stability

Summary form only given. Leucoemeraldine nitrogen amine has been oxidised by air and pure oxygen, and studied by X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (X.P.S.). We discovered that the higher concentration in pure oxygen does not accelerate the oxidation process. Therefore, the air moisture has a great role in this phenomenon. The dopant concentration of the protonated form decreases with exposition time, concurrently to the oxidation process. Moreover, in addition to the amine nitrogen peak in the N1s XPS structure (at 399.0 eV calibrated versus C1s at 284.4 eV) of the base form, two peaks appear respectively at - 1.0 eV and +0.9 eV versus amine binding energy and correspond to imine and tertiary cycled nitrogen. A mechanism reaction is proposed to justify this tertiary nitrogen.