David D. Evanoff

Color kinetic nanoparticles.

Eu3+ doped LaF3 nanoparticles functionalized with a 3-4 formylphenyl benzoic acid ligand were synthesized. Excitation energy-dependent energy transfer from the ligand to Eu3+ yields color tunability from the red to greenish-blue as a function of excitation wavelengths. This synthetic approach provides large shifts in the resultant chromaticity with an excitation wavelength including the generation of white light.

Electroluminescent colloidal inks for flexographic roll-to-roll printing

The academic and commercial interest in organic light-emitting devices is motivated in part by the potential of building devices utilizing simple and inexpensive fabrication routes, for example, commercial printing techniques. The focus on synthetically challenging small molecules and π-conjugated polymers for these devices is countered by the alternative of developing emissive materials that utilize an electroluminescent dye embedded in a hole and electron transporting host. In this effort, we exploit readily obtainable materials and simple fabrication routes to produce light-emitting colloidal particles, which in turn allows us to invoke the concept of a “particle device”. Specifically, we present colloidally based organic light emitting devices that can be designed to produce a range of colors by mixing together various ratios of red-, green-, and blue-emitting particles. These aqueous-based colloids are adaptable to form printing inks and may be utilized in fabricating devices through high-throughput commercial printing technologies.

Nanocomposite liquids for 193 nm immersion lithography: a progress report

Immersion lithography is a new promising approach capable of further increasing the resolution of semiconductor devices. This technology requires the development of new immersion media that satisfy the following conditions: the media should have high refractive index, be transparent and photochemically stable in DUV spectral range. They should also be inert towards photoresists and optics and be liquid to permit rapid scanning. Here we propose and explore a novel strategy in which high refractive index medium is made of small solid particles suspended in liquid phases (nanocomposite liquids). The dielectric particles have high refractive index and the refractive index of nanocomposite liquids becomes volume weighted average between refractive indices of nanoparticles and the liquid phase. We investigate aluminum oxide (alumina) nanoparticles suspended in water. Alumina is known to have high (1.95) refractive index and low absorption coefficient at 193 nm. Alumina nanoparticles were prepared by chemical methods followed by removal of organic molecules left after hydrolysis reactions. Measurements of optical and reological properties of the nanocomposite liquid demonstrated potential advantage of this approach for 193 nm immersion lithography.

Copolymers of 2-(9H-Carbazol-9-yl)ethyl 2-Methylacrylate and 4-[5-(4-tert-Butylphenyl)-1,3,4-oxadiazol-2-yl]phenyl 2-Methylacrylate: Correlating Hole Drift Mobility and Electronic Structure Calculations with Electroluminescence

Methacrylate monomers functionalized with pendant carbazole and oxadiazole moieties were copolymerized into random copolymers with varying carbazole/oxadiazole ratios. Specifically, the monomers of 2-(9H-carbazol-9-yl)ethyl 2-methylacrylate (CE) and 4-[5-(4-tert-butylphenyl)-1,3,4-oxadiazol-2-yl]phenyl 2-methylacrylate (tBPOP) were copolymerized in various ratios, and the inherent hole drift mobilities were assessed through time-of-flight techniques. At a field strength of 345 kV/cm, the homopolymer PCE exhibited a hole mobility of 5.9 x 10(-7) cm(2)/V.s, which was approximately twice the value of the technologically important poly(9-vinylcarbazole), which exhibited a value of 2.8 x 10(-7) cm(2)/V.s. The range of hole mobilities in the copolymers varied from 2.4 x 10(-8) cm(2)/V.s for copolymers containing 50 mol % of the carbazole-containing monomer residue to 3.0 x 10(-7) cm(2)/V.s for copolymers that incorporated 88 mol % of the residue. Density functional theory (B3LYP/6-21G*) and optical absorption derived highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) and lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO) energies of CE were -5.39 and -1.94 eV, respectively, while the corresponding oxadiazole monomer (tBPOP) had a HOMO energy of -5.99 eV and a LUMO energy of -2.23 eV. The mean luminous efficiency of coumarin 6 doped single-layer devices constructed from the poly(CE-co-tBPOP) copolymers indicated a relatively flat efficiency of ca. 0.25 cd/A over a wide carbazole mole fraction content of 0.30-0.70.

Quantitative Infrared Spectroscopy in the Undergraduate Laboratory Via Multivariate Mixture Analysis of a Simulated Analgesic

ABSTRACT Infrared spectroscopy has been utilized for nearly a century as a qualitative tool for, at least, partial structure elucidation. More recently, infrared spectroscopy has become a powerful, reliable quantitative analysis tool in industrial chemistry applications, especially in the areas of quality control. Unfortunately, this newer aspect of infrared spectroscopy is often not conveyed during the undergraduate chemical education experiences. We describe an undergraduate laboratory experiment that illustrates the application of infrared spectroscopy combined with multivariate data analysis in the concentration determination of a three-component solid state mixture.

Characterization of the Plasmonic Fluorescence Enhancement of Poly (3-hexylthiophene) for Organic Solar Cell Applications

The dependence of surface-enhanced fluorescence of the semiconducting polymer poly (3-hexylthiophene) on the diameter of silver nanoparticles was studied. Particle suspensions with a high degree of monodispersity, ranging in diameter from 15 to 153 nm, were synthesized. Polymer films were spin-cast onto substrates containing immobilized silver particles. Fluorescence enhancement factors ranged from 0.9 to 4.9 and generally improved with increasing particle size. Normalization of the fluorescence enhancement to the number of interrogated particles showed an 800-fold increase in enhancement between the smallest and largest particles.