Immobilization Strategies for Organic Semiconducting Conjugated Polymers.

This Review details synthetic routes toward and properties of insoluble polymeric organic semiconductors obtained through desolubilization strategies. Typical applications include fixation of donor-acceptor bulk-heterojunction morphologies in organic photovoltaic cells, cross-linking of charge transport materials and active emitters in light emitting diodes or similar devices, and immobilization of morphologies in field effect transistors. A second important application is the structuring of organic semiconductors, using them as photoresists. After desolubilization, removal of the nonirradiated resist leads to elevated, micron-sized features of the semiconductor. In this Review, different strategies for desolubilization are covered. By photochemical or thermal cleavage of solubility-mediating groups such as esters, sulfonium salts, amides, ethers, and acetals or by retro-Diels-Alder reactions, volatile elimination products and the insoluble semiconductor are formed. In another case, desolubilization is achieved by cross-linking via functional groups present in the polymer side chains including vinyl, halide, silicone, boronic acid, and azide functionalities, which polymerize thermally or photochemically. Alternatively, small molecular additives such as photoacids, oligothiols, or oligoazides result in network formation in combination with compatible functional groups present in the immobilizable polymers. Advantages and disadvantages of the respective methods are discussed.

True Blue Through Oxidation-A Thiaazulenic Heterophenoquinone as Electrochrome.

A thiaazulenic quinone TAQ was synthesized and its optical and redox properties were investigated. The deep blue-colored compound is readily and reversibly reduced to the colorless anionic state. Electrochromic films were prepared and showed reversible switching behavior for the anodically coloring and NIR electrochromic material.

"Butterfly Wings" Stabilize Heptacene.

The synthesis of bisalkynylated derivatives of tetrabenzo[a,c,p,r]heptacene and tetrabenzo[a,c,l,n]pentacene via two-/fourfold Stille reactions involving a 9-stannafluorene and suitable tetrabromoacenes is reported. These triphenylene-"winged" heptacenes are surprisingly stable and maintain a significant portion of the electronic properties of heptacenes.

Efficiency-limiting processes in cyclopentadithiophene-bridged donor-acceptor-type dyes for solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells.

The charge generation and recombination processes in three novel push-pull photosensitizers for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) are studied by ps-µs transient absorption (TA) and quasi-steady-state photoinduced absorption (PIA) spectroscopy. The three cyclopentadithiophene-based photosensitizer dye molecules exhibit comparably low power conversion efficiencies ranging from 0.8% to 1.7% in solid-state DSSCs. We find that the photocurrents increase in the presence of Li-salt additives. Both TA and PIA measurements observe long-lived dye cations created by electron injection from the dyes' excited state for two dyes from the series. However, the third dye shows significantly lower performance as a consequence of the less efficient electron injection even after the addition of Li-salts and faster electron-hole recombination on the ns-µs time scale. In essence, the prerequisites for this class of donor-π bridge-acceptor photosensitizers to reach higher charge generation efficiencies are a combination of strong dipole moments and fine tuning of the electronic landscape at the titania-dye interface by Li-salt addition.

Bromination Improves the Electron Mobility of Tetraazapentacene.

A cyclocondensation of TIPS-ethynyl-substituted diaminoarenes with in situ obtained 4,5-dibromocyclohexa-3,5-diene-1,2-dione has led to the synthesis of tetrabromotetraazapentacene (BrTAP). BrTAP is easily reduced to its air-stable radical anion and electron mobilities >0.56 cm2 V-1 s-1 can be achieved in thin-film transistors.

A New Solution to an Old Problem: Synthesis of Unsubstituted Poly(para-phenylene).

Unsubstituted and structurally well-defined poly(para-phenylene) (PPP) has been long-desired as an organic semiconductor prototype of conjugated polymers. To date, several attempts to synthesize unsubstituted, pristine, high-molecular-weight PPP have failed. Here we solved this synthetic problem by a versatile precursor route. Suzuki polymerization of kinked disubstituted 1,4-dimethoxycyclohexadienylene monomers yielded a well-soluble, nonaromatic precursor polymer. Its solubility allowed processing by spin-coating into nanometer-thick films. Subsequent additive-free thermal treatment induced aromatization and led to exclusively para-connected, highly fluorescent PPP with a length of about 75 phenylene units.

A Stable π-Conjugated Singlet Biradical.

A large polycyclic hydrocarbon with a singlet biradical ground state has been obtained by the combined effects of topology and electron-accepting aromatic substituents, which stabilize its open-shell singlet state.

Hexasubstituted Benzenes with Ultrastrong Dipole Moments.

Hexasubstituted benzenes have been synthesized with the highest known dipole moments, as determined by dielectric spectroscopy and DFT methods. Based on the preparation of 4,5-diamino-3,6-dibromophthalonitrile, combined with a novel method to synthesize dihydrobenzimidazoles, these benzene derivatives have dipole moments in excess of 10 debye. Such dipole moments are desirable in ferroelectrics, nonlinear optics, and in organic photovoltaics. Structure determination was achieved through single-crystal X-ray crystallography, and the optical properties were determined by UV/Vis absorption and fluorescence spectroscopy.

Alternating donor-acceptor arrays from hexa-peri-hexabenzocoronene and benzothiadiazole: synthesis, optical properties, and self-assembly.

Donor-acceptor (D-A) structures were obtained by alternating arrays of hexa-peri-hexabenzocoronene (HBC) and benzo[c][1,2,5]thiadiazole (BTZ). Optoelectronic investigations revealed a charge transfer due to strong push-pull interactions. 2 D wide-angle X-ray scattering (WAXS) data indicated an arrangement in liquid-crystalline columnar assemblies, in which the π-stacking distances and molecular orientation depend on the number of HBC units in the molecules.

Reverse Engineering of Conjugated Microporous Polymers: Defect Structures of Tetrakis(4-ethynylphenyl)stannane Networks.

Two different conjugated microporous polymers (CMPs) based on tetrakis(4-ethynylphenyl)stannane as the repeating unit were synthesized and their BET surfaces and thermal properties were investigated. The first direct method to elucidate the molecular structure of the organic linkers between the tin centers by digestion of the CMP is described. Selective cleavage of the tin-carbon bonds with chloroacetic acid afforded the isolated bridging units and provided insight into the surprisingly varied chemical composition of these networks.

Tetraazapentacene constructs: controlling bulk-morphology through molecular dimensionality.

Multi-core TIPSTAP-constructs of different dimensionality were created via "geometrization" of the monomeric, highly crystalline parent using alkyne linkers. Morphological diversity is produced, while the material acceptor strength remains untouched. We establish structure-function relationships as the bulk morphology is predicted from the molecular geometry.

Chemical Tongues and Noses Based upon Conjugated Polymers.

We report the uses of conjugated polymers in multisensory applications and in chemical and optoelectronic tongues. We look at the potential of single polymers to discriminate multiple analytes and into small libraries of conjugated polymers that represent sensors. These small libraries combine several barely selective, promiscuous sensor elements and react with the analytes in a fairly non-selective fashion by change of color, emission wavelength, or emission intensity. In such optoelectronic noses and tongues, response of a single element is not specific or particularly useful at all, but the response pattern after the combination of several sensor elements is often specific for an analyte and allows discrimination and identification without any problem. These types of tongues and noses are well suited for quality control of foodstuff, beverages, and biological species such as proteins or cells. The discriminative process is often not well understood but it is powerful, particularly if the obtained data are analyzed by sophisticated statistical methods, i.e., linear discriminant analysis and/or principal component analysis. This added layer of analysis extracts the hidden information/patterns out of the data and allows visualization of the results.

Self-assembly and charge carrier transport of solution-processed conjugated polymer monolayers on dielectric surfaces with controlled sub-nanometer roughness.

In recent years organic field-effect transistors have received extensive attention, however, it is still a great challenge to fabricate monolayer-based devices of conjugated polymers. In this study, one single layer of poly(2,5-bis(3-alkylthiophen-2-yl)thieno[3,2-b]thiophene) is directly dip-coated, and its self-assembly is precisely tuned from nanofibers to granular aggregates by controlling the dielectric roughness on a sub-nanometer scale. The charge carrier transport of the monolayer transistor exhibits a strong dependence on the dielectric roughness, which is attributed to the roughness-induced effects of higher densities of grain boundaries and charge trapping sites as well as surface scattering. These results mark a great advance in the bottom-up fabrication of organic electronics.

Transition between band and hopping transport in polymer field-effect transistors.

Hall effect and slightly negative temperature dependence of the mobility in polymeric transistors are demonstrated. The semiconductor channel is based on a polycyclopentadithiophene-benzothiadiazole (CDT-BTZ) donor-acceptor copolymer film whose chain direction is oriented by mechanical compression at the surface of an ionic liquid. The mobility is 5.6 cm(2) V(-1) s(-1) at room temperature, and is further improved to 6.7 cm(2) V(-1) s(-1) at 260 K.

Electrochemically exfoliated graphene as solution-processable, highly conductive electrodes for organic electronics.

Solution-processable thin layer graphene is an intriguing nanomaterial with tremendous potential for electronic applications. In this work, we demonstrate that electrochemical exfoliation of graphite furnishes graphene sheets of high quality. The electrochemically exfoliated graphene (EG) contains a high yield (>80%) of one- to three-layer graphene flakes with high C/O ratio of 12.3 and low sheet resistance (4.8 kΩ/□ for a single EG sheet). Due to the solution processability of EG, a vacuum filtration method in association with dry transfer is introduced to produce large-area and highly conductive graphene films on various substrates. Moreover, we demonstrate that the patterned EG can serve as high-performance source/drain electrodes for organic field-effect transistors.