High Performance Full-Color Room-Temperature Phosphorescence Polymer Microspheres and Their Applications

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Polymer Chemistry
• Photophysics

Background:

• Room temperature phosphorescence (RTP) polymer materials offer modifiability and ease of preparation for flexible electronics and information encryption.
• Flexible polymer structures often lead to a trade-off between high quantum yields (Φ_P) and short phosphorescence lifetimes (τ_P), or vice versa.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a strategy for enhancing RTP properties of flexible polymers.
• To create rigid polymer microspheres with improved phosphorescence quantum yields, lifetimes, and brightness.

Main Methods:

• An in situ cross-linked self-assembly strategy was employed to transform flexible weak RTP polymers into rigid polymer microspheres.
• Characterization of the resulting microspheres (PM1) for phosphorescence properties (τ_P, Φ_P, brightness) and stability.

Main Results:

• The RTP microspheres (PM1) achieved maximum τ_P of 2020 ms and Φ_P of 34.1%, with brightness up to 655.1 mcd/m².
• These properties represent significant improvements (6.4-, 5.3-, and 10.2-fold increases) compared to the intrinsic flexible polymer (P1).
• The microspheres demonstrated excellent stability in acidic, basic, and aqueous environments, and the doped film showed high sensitivity for aniline detection (3.7 × 10^-8 m).

Conclusions:

• The in situ cross-linked self-assembly strategy effectively enhances RTP properties of flexible polymers by forming rigid microspheres.
• These novel RTP microspheres possess superior photophysical properties and stability, outperforming existing RTP polymer materials.
• The developed materials show promise for applications in sensing, particularly for selective and sensitive detection of analytes like aniline.