Development of Water-Soluble Chromophores and Polyelectrolytes

Semiconducting polymers offer flexible, lightweight, low-cost materials that are used in various applications such as sensors or as active-layer materials in electronic devices such as organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). However, most of these semiconducting polymers are shown to be compatible and/or soluble in organic solvents, which carries health and environmental concerns for the synthesis and processing of the materials. As such, there is a need to design new polymeric systems compatible with environmentally benign solvents, such as water. This study will focus on developing water-soluble conjugated polymers which may simultaneously lend their compatibility in biological environments. These polymers are hypothesized to be useful in applications such as nuclei-cell imaging and may be integrated into biomedical devices as sensors or probes. Specifically, the approach will involve a side-chain engineering strategy where the peripheral functionalization of dihydropyrrolopyrrole (DHPP) chromophores and monomers facilitates the development of novel conjugated polyelectrolytes with superior solubility in polar solvents compared to previous iterations of DHPP polymers. Results from these efforts will reveal important structure-property relationships that serve to guide continued development of materials with applicability across a suite of applications. By nature, this research is an interdisciplinary approach utilizing synthetic organic/polymer chemistry for biologically relevant materials