Single‐Molecule Spectroscopy for Plastic Electronics: Materials Analysis from the Bottom‐Up

Abstract

pi-conjugated polymers find a range of applications in electronic devices. These materials are generally highly disordered in terms of chain length and chain conformation, besides being influenced by a variety of chemical and physical defects. Although this characteristic can be of benefit in certain device applications, disorder severely complicates materials analysis. Accurate analytical techniques are, however, crucial to optimising synthetic procedures and assessing overall material purity. Fortunately, single-molecule spectroscopic techniques have emerged as an unlikely but uniquely powerful approach to unraveling intrinsic material properties from the bottom up. Building on the success of such techniques in the life sciences, single-molecule spectroscopy is finding increasing applicability in materials science, effectively enabling the dissection of the bulk down to the level of the individual molecular constituent. This article reviews recent progress in single molecule spectroscopy of conjugated polymers as used in organic electronics.

Electrically driven photon antibunching from a single molecule at room temperature

“…To prove single-molecule electroluminescence 30 , population kinetics were analysed by measuring photon correlation statistics. Therefore, a constant voltage of 12 V was applied and an isolated emission site was selected.…”

Light scattering under nanofocusing: Towards coherent nanoscopies

“…The past decades have witnessed the development of several successful attempts in this regard, such as scanning near-field optical microscopy (SNOM) [1][2][3][4][5], single-molecule spectroscopy [6][7][8][9][10] and the combination of the two [11][12][13][14]. These efforts have however suffered from the mismatch between light and nanoscale matter, which leads to a small throughput between the input and output signals.…”

Conformation and physics of polymer chains: a single-molecule perspective

“…Apart from biological applications, single-molecule spectroscopy has provided exceptional insights into the properties of soft and complex materials, and holds great promise for further development in this fi eld. For recent reviews, see Refs [3][4][5][6][7][8]. Th ere will, no doubt, be further qualitative progress related to recently developed super-resolution microscopic techniques [9][10], which overcome the diff raction limit in optical imaging and bring the resolution closer to the molecular scale.…”

“…Although cryogenic single-molecule spectroscopy provides unprecedented insights into the energy landscapes of conjugated polymers, for practical applications of polymers as functional materials, room-temperature spectral characteristics and excited-state dynamics are most relevant. Low-temperature work has also been reviewed extensively elsewhere [8].…”