Fabrication of Polymer−Nanoparticle Composite Inverse Opals by a One-Step Electrochemical Co-deposition Process

We describe a one-step electrochemical co-deposition method to prepare nanoparticle (NP)-containing semiconducting polymer inverse opals with well-defined pore structure. Gold and cadmium telluride NPs were electrodeposited along with pyrrole in the interstitial voids of colloidal crystals of polymer spheres, and following template removal, composite inverse opals were obtained. The optical characteristics (position of the optical stopband) of the resulting composite films can be tuned through variation of the type and concentration of the NPs embedded in the film.