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Morphology and photophysical properties of luminescent electrospun fibers prepared from diblock and triblock polyfluorene-block-Poly(2-vinylpyridine)/PEO blends

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Abstract

We successfully prepared luminescent electrospun (ES) fibers from the polymer blends of diblock poly[2,7-(9,9-dihexylfluorene)]-block-poly(2-vinylpyridine)(di-PFPVP) or triblock P2VP-b-PF-b-P2VP (tri-PFPVP) with polyethylene oxide (PEO) using a single-capillary spinneret. The morphology and photophysical properties of ES fibers were explored via the molecular architecture, solvent selectivity, and different molecular weights of PEO. The ES fibers had diameters around 400–800 nm using solvent of methanol (MeOH)/H2O while those using CHCl3 were around 1–3 μm, which was probably due to the difference on the solvent dielectric constant. Furthermore, the PF aggregated size and emission peak maximum in the ES fibers increased with enhancing the block copolymer composition using CHCl3. However, an insignificant variation was observed using MeOH/H2O. The larger PF aggregated size of the di-PFPVP/PEO blend ES fibers resulted in the red-shifting and broader emission peak, in comparison with that of the tri-PFPVP/PEO blend ES fibers. The efficient interaction of the PEO with the PVP block in two different block copolymers accounted for the above results. In the ES fibers using the low molecular weight of PEO (Mn~100 K), it exhibited a red-shifting on the PL spectra in comparison with the spin-coated films due to the geometrical confinement. Nevertheless, such confinement was probably significantly reduced using the high molecular weight PEO (Mn~2000 K) and thus an insignificant variation was found on the PL spectra. The present study demonstrated that their aggregate morphology and photophysical properties of ES fibers prepared from conjugated rod-coil block copolymer blends could be significantly tuned through polymer architecture, solvent selectivity, and copolymer composition.

The PF-b-P2VP and P2VP-b-PF-b-P2VP/PEO ES fibers exhibit various aggregated morphologies and photophysical properties through polymer architecture, solvent selectivity, and copolymer composition.

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Acknowledgements

The financial supports from the National Science Council of Taiwan, National Taiwan University (Excellent Research Projects), and Ministry of Economic Affairs of Taiwan are highly appreciated.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Polymer Science and Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan

    Chi-Ching Kuo & Wen-Chang Chen

  2. Department of Chemical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan

    Chia-Hung Lin, Ping Tzeng & Wen-Chang Chen

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  1. Chi-Ching Kuo
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  2. Chia-Hung Lin
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  4. Wen-Chang Chen
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Correspondence to Wen-Chang Chen.

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ESM1

FE-SEM images of ES fibers for both di-PFPVP/PEO and tri-PFPVP/PEO (PEO Mn~100 K) from MeOH/H2O: di-PFPVP (a) 10 wt%, (b) 40 wt%; tri-PFPVP (c) 10 wt%, (d) 40 wt%. (DOC 647 kb)

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Kuo, CC., Lin, CH., Tzeng, P. et al. Morphology and photophysical properties of luminescent electrospun fibers prepared from diblock and triblock polyfluorene-block-Poly(2-vinylpyridine)/PEO blends. J Polym Res 18, 1091–1100 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10965-010-9511-4

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